The Philatelist like to show the big future plans of socialist five year plan stamps. The date attached to the plan lets you check if they actually got done what they were planning. The oil rich socialist countries like 70s Libya had plenty of resources to get such things done as this stamp issue from 1979 shows. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist,
This stamp shows at intermediate stage of a now much larger hospital complex in Benghazi. The large hospital in Tripoli was built and staffed by Italians in colonial times so doesn’t make the socialist’s point. This issue on the 10th anniversary of the green revolution that ended the Monarchy consisted of four blocks of four stamps each. This block covered health care, others education, agriculture, and the oil industry.
Todays stamp is issue A235, a 30 Dirhams stamp issued by the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya on September 1st, 1979. Each block of four stamps was a different denomination. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 40 cents whether unused or canceled to order.
Libya was a large country with a small population. In colonial times, there were some hospitals built and the staff was largely Italian. Oil revenue in the 1960s and 1970s greatly increased public health spending and many Libyan students were sent abroad to study medicine so they could replace the foreign guest worker health staff. By the late days of the Jamahiriya, Libya had 96 hospitals and just over 10,000 medical doctors. 84 percent of the doctors were native.
The foreign health care workers became controversial in Libya in 1998. At the Benghazi children’s hospital, 500 babies came down with HIV/AIDS. It is now believed the outbreak was caused by poor sanitation in the handling of blood. Many of the babies died and more were sent to Europe for better treatment. A Libyan magazine accused Bulgarian nurses working at the hospital of purposely injecting the babies with the disease. Violent protest outside the hospital lead to the arrest of 23 Bulgarian nurses. Under torture, 6 confessed to the crime and were sentenced to death. After 7 years in jail in Libya, Bulgaria was able to barter for their freedom with arms.
You get a sense with these stamps how much money was being spent on Libyan wish lists. In 1979, American President Jimmy Carter’s brother Billy received at least $200,000 to lobby for additional Lockheed C130 transports made in Georgia for Libya. When caught, Billy Carter belatedly registered as an agent of Libya and the then President had to inform Congress that his relationship with his brother will be altered for as long as he was president and would have no influence on relations with Libya.
Another American operation was diverted by the free flowing money of the Jamahiriya. A retired CIA agent, Edwin Wilson was sent to Libya in 1979 with a few retired Green Berets to look out for and apprehend international terrorist Carlos the Jackal. Once there they instead set up a business training Libyan and Palestinian paramilitary forces including on the use of explosives. Wilson was caught when he tried to acquire for Libya a large stock of C4 explosives. At first Wilson avoided criminal charges by staying in exile in Libya but was worried for his safety there. He then flew to the Dominican Republic where he was extradited back to the USA.
The Benghazi hospital complex has not fared well during the last decade’s civil war in Libya. In 2015 the complex was heavily looted. In 2018 there was a controversy when pictures of the rotting corpses of babies in the hospital morgue got out. This time there were no Bulgarians to blame, but I imagine the Libyans do not spend much time looking in the mirror. It is a lot easier to hire someone to build you a building than to provide decent medical care inside.
Well my drink is empty. Come again tomorrow when there will be another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.