Libya's "Lost Generation"

What a day. What a week. No deep thoughts, just this link to a recent article on Libya's youth from the Dallas Morning News:

TRIPOLI, Libya – Redha Belhaj's life has not moved as he had hoped.

"At this moment, I don't have a car or a job or a house," said Mr. Belhaj, 26, an aspiring architect who smiles wearily as he expresses disappointment. "When will I have those things? If I had enough money, I would be engaged or married. It makes me very sad."

...Recent estimates by consultants put Libya's unemployment rate at 25 percent. Many of the unemployed are men about Mr. Belhaj's age. Their ranks have grown so large that prominent Libyans refer to them as the country's "lost generation."

...With only 5.8 million people, the country has an ample supply of jobs that Libyans traditionally shun. Foreigners from other African countries fill most of these jobs in hotels, restaurants and construction. Many Libyans have grown attached to easy government jobs facilitated by oil revenues. There is little incentive to work hard – wages have been fixed by law since 1981 – or even show up.

...Mr. Dernawi had already interrupted his studies several times to work as an electrician, plumber and painter of curbs and gutters. Although tuition was free, he could not afford tools like design paper and aerial photographs, which quadrupled in price during the period of sanctions.

....To save money for a house and to get married after a four-year engagement, he also works at one of Tripoli's few gourmet coffee shops and designs computerized blueprints for architects.

...He confesses that so much work, and so few resources for planning his life, leaves him "boiling inside." Still, he thinks of returning to the university.

"Of course, I have to live in a daydream," Mr. Dernawi says. "We have to hope that it changes."

The man whose 36 years of corrupt rule has spawned the "lost generation" is pictured above. But congratulations to Mr. Dernawi for continuing to hope and pursue a "daydream"; change will come soon.

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