TIMES ONLINE: You are never alone in Libya. From the moment you arrive at Tripoli international airport, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi is with you.
Wherever you go, the Great Leader and Father of the Revolution watches benevolently over you, never more so than now as he prepares to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the coup that brought him to power.
As befits Africa’s longest-serving leader, he stares down from a thousand billboards, from great banners draped down the sides of skyscrapers, from bunting stretched across streets, from official portraits in every shop and hotel lobby, from hoardings at the remotest junctions in the desert. Nobody else gets a look-in.
His image is reproduced in neon, on mosaics and across the sides of the hot-air balloons tethered in Green Square in readiness for next Tuesday’s celebrations. It appears on the huge electronic clocks counting down the minutes to that great occasion.
His is a personality cult that makes Mao Zedong, Saddam Hussein or Kim Jong Il look self-effacing. >>> Martin Fletcher in Tripoli | Friday, August 28, 2009
