Three months have passed since the fall of Sirte and Muammar Gaddafi’s final, fateful attempt to escape justice. Across Libya the mood is one of euphoria, celebration and hope – for the first time in 42 years the population sees a brighter future ahead.

For the ACTED team in the country, as for Libya itself, the coming months will be a time of transition. The emergency phase is winding down in most areas, as the post emergency process begins.

The changes will be varied and far reaching, and ACTED will continue to play an active role in helping shape Libya’s future, first by shifting its set up with the head office to be transferred from Benghazi, the city that lit the revolutionary spark, to Tripoli. In Misrata too, the scene of desperate urban warfare early on in the conflict and a subsequent siege that threatened to squeeze the life out of the city, the Humanitarian Hub operated by ACTED is to be scaled down in size. In the absence of any UN agencies in the city, ACTED’s role over the past 8 months has been vital, ensuring close coordination of all INGOs in the area, highlighting all relevant cluster needs, facilitating the supply of food and other essential items into the besieged enclave and providing a focal point for all international humanitarian operations in the city.

The successes of the Humanitarian Hub in Misrata have led to the creation of a “Sub Hub” in Sirte, where needs are still acute and the population still suffers as a result of the heaviest fighting of the entire conflict. Gaddafi’s hometown, it will now also be remembered as the scene of his final stand, as evinced by the levels of destruction unseen anywhere else in the country.

A “Sub Hub” for coordination based in Sirte

ACTED was amongst the first humanitarian actors to respond to the emerging displacement crisis affecting the city, working in coordination with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the World Food Programme (WFP) to distribute essential food and non food items (NFIs) to those families uprooted by the fighting.

To date ACTED has distributed over 800 metric tons of food to more than 45,000 displaced people. With winter now arrived and the weather turning increasingly cold and inclement, it was also vitally important that all families were provided with adequate essentials to survive the winter; to this end ACTED has distributed blankets, mattresses, hygiene kits and other items to more than 7,500 families.

Salah Abd el Fatah, Head of the Sirte Relief Committee, explains how much this relief was awaited by local populations: “The fighting in our city was very intense, with almost the entire population forced to flee their homes. ACTED’s intervention has played a vital role in assisting many of these families and ensuring that they have enough provisions for the coming weeks.”

There is still plenty of work to be done however, and ACTED is once again playing a vital coordination role. Through the Sirte Sub Hub ACTED is hosting interagency meetings, bringing together humanitarian actors and, in partnership with Télécoms sans Frontières, providing internet and communications access for all who wish to use it.

Not only is the Sub Hub a focal point for all INGOs and local actors in Sirte, it is also a vital base for ACTED’s own ongoing operations, which include: Cash for Work school cleaning projects, a shelter assessment by the REACH mapping unit of all damaged properties in the war torn city (of which there are thousands), essential support to bakeries in the area, and continued IDP assistance through ongoing distributions and continued monitoring of the situation.

The civil society at the heart of change

Yet ACTED is also looking beyond emergency rehabilitation in 2012, towards helping shape a more inclusive, more representative future for the people of Libya. To this end, a new two year project has begun, focusing on supporting the emergence and development of civil society in Libya, in cooperation with EuropeAid and Alliance2015 partners CESVI and People in Need (PIN). Thousands of nascent local NGOs, newspapers, community groups and rights organisations have sprung up since the crisis, highlighting the earnest wish amongst Libyans for their voices to be heard under the new government.

ACTED intends to support, develop and encourage these local operators throughout the country, focusing on the three principal urban centres of Tripoli, Benghazi and Misrata but also widening the scope to include other regions. The activities involved are designed to be as far-reaching as possible, and will include establishing resource centres in the three cities; providing capacity building and training to local civil society organisations (CSOs); drawing up local development plans, in close consultation with CSOs and community leaders; and facilitating regional dialogue and interchange through conferences and events. With elections to represent those who will draft the new Libyan constitution only months away, the time to act is now.

The road ahead for the new Libya will be long and hard, lined with many potential pitfalls, yet the revolutionary ideals are still very much alive. ACTED intends to help ensure that the dream becomes reality.