Gaddafi's Harem

by Cojean, Annick

  That was the day I had the second great shock of my life, and from that moment on my expression would never be pure again. I’m not telling you this with any joy. I’m forcing myself because I committed myself to telling my story, as a testimony, and because people need to understand why this monster enjoyed such complete impunity. But the scenes are so cruel and humiliating to describe, so embarrassing and shameful for me and the other bystanders whom Gaddafi insidiously turned into accomplices so that they would never risk recounting his perversions. This was a man who had seized the power to decide over the life and death of others, a man who defiled all those who had the misfortune of coming near him.

  Mabrouka called me. “Get dressed, your master wants you,” which meant: “Get undressed and go upstairs.” She pushed the door open, and then an insane scene appeared before my eyes. The Guide was naked, sodomizing Ali, while Houssam was dancing, dressed and made up like a woman, to that same languid Egyptian song. I wanted to run back to my room but Houssam cried out “Master, there’s Soraya!” and motioned me to dance with him. I was paralyzed. Then Gaddafi called out: “Come here, slut.” He threw Ali aside and seized me furiously. Houssam was dancing, Ali was watching, and, for the second time in a few days, I wanted to die. They had no right to do this to me.

  And then Mabrouka came in and ordered the boys to leave and the master to stop because there was an emergency. He withdrew immediately and told me to get the hell out. I ran to my room, sobbing, and stayed in the shower for the rest of the evening. I kept washing myself and crying. I simply couldn’t stop. He was insane, they were all insane; it was a house of lunatics, and I didn’t want to be among them a moment longer. I wanted my parents, my brothers, my sister; I wanted my old life. But that was no longer possible. He had wrecked everything. He was repulsive. And he was the president of my country.

  Amal came to see me and I begged her: “Please, please speak to Mabrouka. I can’t take this anymore, I want my mother . . .” I saw her become emotional for the first time. “Oh, my little darling!” she said, taking me in her arms. “Your story is so much like mine. They took me from school as well. I was fourteen.” She was now twenty-five and loathed her life.

  4

  RAMADAN

  One day I found out that Gaddafi and his coterie were supposed to leave on an official visit to Dakar and that I wouldn’t be traveling with them. What a relief. For three days I was able to breathe and move around freely between my room and the cafeteria, where I’d see Amal and a few other girls, including Fatiha, who had stayed behind on guard duty at Bab al-Azizia. They smoked, drank coffee, and chatted. I kept quiet, on the lookout for the tiniest bit of information on how this deranged community functioned. Sadly, they never said anything of substance. However, I did find out that Amal was able to go out during the day with a driver from Bab al-Azizia, which completely astonished me. She was free . . . and she came back? How in the world did that make sense? Why didn’t she run away, as I’d dreamed of doing every second I’d been inside these walls? There were so many things I simply didn’t understand.

  I also discovered that most of the girls, known as “revolutionary guards,” were given a card, which I thought was a badge but which was an actual identity card. It had their picture, their first name, and the title “Daughter of Muammar Gaddafi” in bold letters above the personal signature and a small photo of the Guide. This “daughter” title seemed rather overblown to me. But the card itself was clearly an open door to the area just outside the compound of Bab al-Azizia and even to the city itself, after one went through countless security doors that were guarded by armed soldiers. Much later on, I heard that the status of these “daughters” and the true nature of their function did not fool anyone. But they valued their card. Sure, they were seen as whores, but still, they were whores of the supreme Guide, and that earned them respect anywhere they went.

  The group returned on the fourth day and the whole of the basement was in a fever of excitement. Along with his baggage, the Guide had brought back a large number of African women, some very young, some older, all heavily made-up, showing off their cleavage, wearing boubous or skintight jeans. Mabrouka was playing mistress of the house and fussing over them. “Amal! Soraya! Hurry, bring coffee and cake!” So we had to dash between the kitchen and the drawing rooms, zigzagging between the cheerful women, all eager to see the Colonel. He was still in his office, meeting with some important-looking African gentlemen. But when they left I saw the women go up, one after another, to the Guide’s bedroom. I was watching them from afar, dying to tell them, “Watch out, he’s a monster!” but also: “Help me get out of here!” Mabrouka caught my gaze and seemed annoyed that we’d stayed in the room when she’d asked Faisal to serve. “Each of you to your own room,” she commanded, clapping her hands.

  Salma came to get me in the middle of the night and brought me to Gaddafi’s door. He made me smoke one cigarette after another, and then he . . . What word should I use? It was so degrading. I was now no more than an object, a hole. I clenched my teeth, dreading his blows. Then he put on a cassette of the Tunisian singer Nawal Ghachem, and demanded that I dance, over and over and over again, completely naked this time. Salma came in, whispered a few words to him, and straightaway he told me: “You can leave, my love.” What had come over him? He’d never addressed me with anything but insults.

  A low-ranking policewoman, twenty-three years old, ended up in my room the next day. “This is Najah,” Mabrouka said. “She’s going to spend two days with you.” The girl seemed nice enough—direct, and just a tad brazen. And she really wanted to talk. “They’re all just bastards, you know!” she began the first evening. “They never keep a promise. I’ve been with them for seven years and still I’ve never been compensated! Received nothing! Not a thing. Not even a house!” “Watch out,” I said to myself. “Don’t get involved—she may want to set a trap for me.” But she continued confiding in me, and I let her.

  “I heard you were the new young one. Are you getting used to life at Bab al-Azizia?”

  “You have no idea how much I miss my mother.”

  “That will pass . . .”

  “If only I could get in touch with her!”

  “She’ll find out soon enough what you’re doing.”

  “Do you have any advice how I could contact her?”

  “If there’s any advice I would give you, it’s to get out of here!”

  “But I’m a prisoner! I have no choice!”

  “Me, I stay two days, sleep with Gaddafi, which gets me a little money, and I go home.”

  “But I don’t want that either! That’s not my kind of life.”

  “You want to get out? Well, play at being a troublemaker! Put up a fight, make noise, create some problems.”

  “But they’ll kill me! I know they’re more than capable of that. When I resisted he beat me up and raped me.”

  “Tell yourself that he likes hardheaded girls.”

  Then she lay down on her bed, eating pistachio nuts, and watched a porno flick. “You should always be learning!” she said, urging me to watch with her. I was dumbfounded. Learn? After she’d just recommended that I put up a fight? I’d rather sleep.

  The next night we were both called to the Guide’s bedroom. Najah was all excited over the prospect of seeing him again. “Why don’t you put on a black nightie,” she suggested before we went up. When the door opened he was naked, and Najah threw herself at him: “My love! How I’ve missed you!” He looked pleased. “So come here, you whore!” Then turning to me, hopping mad: “Why are you wearing that color I so abhor? Get out of here! Go change!” I rushed down the stairs, noticed Amal in her room, and bummed a cigarette from her. And smoked it once I was back in my room. It was the first time I’d ever lit one on my own, the first time I’d felt the need to smoke. But Salma didn’t let me: “What in the hell are you doing? Your master is waiting for you!
” She took me back into his room at the very moment Najah was painstakingly replaying the scenes from the video. “Put the cassette on and dance!” Gaddafi ordered me. But then he leaped off the bed, ripped off my nightie, and violently raped me. “Get out!” he then said, dismissing me with a motion of his hand. I left the room, badly bruised.

  When Najah, too, returned, I asked her why she had suggested I wear a color he hated. “It’s very strange,” she answered without even looking at me. “Usually he likes black. Perhaps it doesn’t suit you very well . . . But in the end isn’t that just what you wanted? Something to divert his attention away from you?” It suddenly occurred to me that there might be some rivalry between Gaddafi’s girls. What an insane idea! They could keep him for all I cared!

  I woke up the next morning wanting a cigarette. I found Amal having coffee with another girl and asked her for one. She picked up her phone and placed an order: “Would you get some Marlboro Lights and some Slims for us, please?” I couldn’t believe how simple it was! Indeed, all you needed to do was call a driver, who’d stock up and bring the supplies to the garage, where an employee of the house would get them. “It’s not good for you at your age,” Amal said to me. “Don’t fall into the cigarette trap.”

  “But you smoke, too! And we have the same life.”

  She gave me a long look and a sad smile.

  Ramadan was approaching, and one morning I heard that the entire household was moving to Sirte. They gave me a uniform again, told me which car in the convoy I would ride in, and within a few moments I felt the sun caress my face. It had been weeks since I’d left the basement and I was happy to see a little sky. When we arrived at the military compound, the Katiba al-Saadi, Mabrouka came to me and said: “You wanted to see your mother. Well, you’re going to see her.” My heart stopped. I’d been thinking about her every second since my abduction. I dreamed of disappearing in her arms. Day and night I imagined what I would say to her, stumbling over my words, then picking up the story, and trying to reassure myself that she’d understand without my providing any details. Oh, my God! What I wouldn’t have given to see my parents again, my brothers, my little sister Noura . . .

  The car parked across the street from our white ­building. The original trio—Mabrouka, Salma, and Faiza—­accompanied me to the entrance, and I rushed into the stairwell. Mama was waiting for me in our apartment on the third floor. The little ones were at school. We both wept and embraced each other very tightly. She held me close to kiss me, looked me in the eye, laughed, shook her head, wiped away her tears. “Oh, Soraya! You broke my heart! Talk to me, say something!” I couldn’t. I shook my head, hugging her chest. Then she said softly: “Faiza explained to me that Gaddafi took your virginity. My little girl, my little girl! You’re much too young to become a woman . . .” Faiza was coming up the stairs. I heard her loud voice: “That’s enough! Come on down!” Mama clung to me. “Leave my child here with me!” The other woman was already there, looking stern. “God help us,” Mama said. “What can I tell your brothers? Everyone is wondering where you are and I answer that you’ve gone to Tunisia to visit the family or to Tripoli with your father. I’m telling lies to everybody. What are we going to do, Soraya? What will become of you?” Faiza tore me away from her. “When will you bring her back to me again?” Mama asked in tears. “Someday!” And we went back to the Katiba.

  Fatiha was waiting for me. “Your master is asking for you.” When I came into that sand-colored room of his where he’d raped me weeks earlier, Galina and four other Ukrainian women were with him. Galina was massaging Gaddafi while the others sat around him. I waited by the door, strapped in my uniform, still totally overcome by my visit with Mama. How he disgusted me, this monster who thought he was God, stank of garlic and sweat, and thought of nothing but fucking. Once the nurses left, he commanded: “Get undressed!” I wanted to shout “You poor bastard!” and then leave, slamming the door behind me, but in despair I did what he told me. “Get on top of me! You’ve been learning your lessons, haven’t you? And stop eating. You’ve gained weight—I don’t like that!” When it was over he did something he’d never done before. He dragged me over to the Jacuzzi, made me climb up onto the edge of the shower, and urinated on me.

  I shared my room with Farida, the same girl who was there during my first stay at the Katiba. She was lying down, feeling sick, and she was very pale. “I have hepatitis,” she told me.

  “Hepatitis? But I thought the Guide had a phobia about illnesses.”

  “Yes, but it seems that this one is not sexually transmitted.”

  How was it transmitted then? I started to be afraid. That very evening Gaddafi called for us both. He was naked, impatient, and told Farida straightaway: “Come here, slut.” I took advantage of the opportunity: “So I can go?” He had the expression of a madman: “Dance!” I said to myself: “He’s fucking a woman with hepatitis and I’m going to be next.” And so I was, while Farida was told to take her turn dancing.

  We stayed in Sirte for three days. He called for me numerous times. Sometimes there were two, three, four girls at the same time. We didn’t talk to each other. Each girl had her own story, her own fate. And her own saga of misfortune.

  * * *

  Finally it was Ramadan. For my family this was a sacred period, and my mother was very strict about it. There was no question of eating between sunrise and sunset, you’d say the appropriate prayers, and at night you’d feast on delicious things. That’s what I decided to think about all day long before I finally got back to my family. Occasionally, Mama even took us to Morocco and Tunisia to share this time with my grandmother and great-grandmother. It was really marvelous. From the age of two I’d never failed to observe Ramadan, nor even imagined that its rules could be violated. And yet, the night before the beginning of Ramadan, when you are supposed to prepare yourself spiritually to enter into this special period, to silence all desires and senses, Gaddafi tried to hunt me down. The pursuit went on for hours and I felt completely helpless. “This is forbidden, it’s Ramadan!” I pleaded with him at dawn. Other than his commands and insults, he never said a word to me. This time, however, he deigned to answer between two growls: “The only thing that’s forbidden is eating.” To me, that was blasphemy.

  And so I learned how Gaddafi had no respect for anything at all. Not even for Allah! He violated every one of his commandments. He defied even God! Bewildered, I went back down to my room. I had to talk to someone very soon—Amal or another one of the girls. I was truly in shock. But I found no one. I was barred from wandering through the hallways and the basement labyrinth, which was lit by neon lights. My perimeters were extremely limited: my room, his room, the kitchen, the cafeteria, plus on occasion the reception rooms near his office and his small private exercise room. That was it.

  I heard footsteps and the sound of doors opening and closing above my head and knew that Amal and other girls were rushing into the Guide’s bedroom. On Ramadan! When I saw them at dinner that evening I told them how utterly appalled I was. What they were doing was a crime against God, wasn’t it? They burst out laughing! As long as he didn’t come, he had explained to them, as long as he didn’t ejaculate it didn’t count in the eyes of Allah. My eyes opened wide, and that made them laugh even harder. “It’s Ramadan Gaddafi style,” one of the girls concluded.

  He made me come upstairs throughout the month of Ramadan, no matter what hour of the day or night. He’d smoke, he’d fuck, he’d beat me as he howled. And gradually I allowed myself to eat no matter what time of the day it was. What was the use of respecting rules in a universe that had no limits, no law, no logic. I even ended up wondering why my mother made such a fuss over observing any of the Ramadan rituals.

  The twenty-seventh night of Ramadan is known as the Night of Destiny and commemorates the revelation of the Koran to the Prophet. It is often the occasion for grand nighttime festivities and I learned that, indeed, Gaddafi
was going to receive a large number of prestigious guests in his reception halls and an adjacent tent. Mabrouka called us all together so we could put cakes and fruit on platters and serve. I was wearing a black jogging suit with a red sash on the side and I remember that my hair, which came down to my waist, wasn’t held together by a headband or in a bun, as I sometimes wore it. The guests arrived all at the same time and the three halls filled up. There were many spectacularly beautiful African women. Men wearing ties, military men.

  Unfortunately, I recognized nobody—with one exception! Nuri Mesmari, the chief of protocol, with his hair and strange blond beard, his one glass eye behind elegant glasses. I’d seen him on television, and it was strange to see him here, flitting about among the guests. Another man arrived, Saada Al Fallah, who seemed to know the girls personally and handed each one an envelope with five hundred dinars. Pocket money, they told me. I caught his glance several times and sensed he had noticed me. He came over to me, smiling. “Ah! So this is the new little one! Really, how lovely she is!” He laughed as he pinched my cheek, half flirtatious, half paternal. The scene didn’t escape Mabrouka, who promptly called him over: “Saada, come to me right now!” Amal, who was standing close to me, whispered in my ear: “She saw it! Go back to your room quickly. This is serious, I can assure you.”

  So I rushed off, a little worried. An hour or two later Mabrouka pushed open my door. “Go upstairs!” I presented myself at the Guide’s bedroom with Mabrouka on my heels. He was in the process of slipping into a brick red jogging suit and stared at me with a hateful look. “Come here, slut . . . So, you’re playing with your hair to lead everyone on? To be expected, of course: your mother is Tunisian!”