Egypt is in turmoil. The presidential election has raised many questions and given the answer to none. One has to wonder today: was the January 2011 revolution beneficial for the Egyptians?
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” At the time George Washington wrote those words he may have been right. We have seen that throughout history, revolutions have rid nations of ‘tyrants’; the downside to that is the fact that these revolutions, on the short term, are sometimes detrimental to the people. The Egyptian revolution may have gotten rid of the Mubarak regime but now the question is: will Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood be up to the task of rebuilding the nation?
The facts on the ground are edifying. After the revolution, the unemployment rate rose from 8.9 % to 12.4 %. The country’s economy is slowly deteriorating. The current military government has asked the IMF for a loan of US$ 3.2 billion to help stabilize the economy. Mubarak may have been a ruthless authoritarian leader, but at least the country’s economy under his 30-year rule stayed on a stable course, in spite of the fact that while the economy was slowly growing (6% GDP growth in five years), one in five Egyptians lived under the poverty line and the rich grew richer, the poor poorer.
Now with the results of the elections out, Mohammed Morsi appears to have won the election by a comfortable margin thus propelling the long oppressed Muslim Brotherhood into power for the first time in Egyptian history. The organization has been outcast ever since it’s establishment in 1928 under the rule of King Farouk and was thought to have been involved in the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in 1981. It is interconnected with some of the more fundamentalist political ideologies of Islam. Branches of the organization have been linked to religiously motivated acts of violence around the world and some of its members have brazenly called for a ‘move away from secularism’ and advocate the incorporation of Islamic law and governance in all ramifications of the state. Their call for the implementation of Shari’a law means that Egypt’s minorities, particularly the Christians – the Copts form some 10% of the population – will come under great pressure. Is this the end of a once mighty secular Egypt?
The transition from military rule that started with the revolution has certainly been very poorly managed. The initial process should have been seen through to the end, with a proper shift of power. Today the orderly transition is in jeopardy. And it is the task of the military junta still in power to oversee this change in political process to the end as it is the country’s best hope to assuage the rising fears and anxieties of a population who overthrew a dictatorial regime only to see it replaced by the perspectives of harsh and strict governance at the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi may have won the popular vote but the SCAF (Supreme Council of Armed Forces) retains all legislative power and can strip the president of any authority over the armed forces. He may well be the President of Egypt, but the generals still retain all power. Will he simply be a figurehead President with limited power and let the generals impose their rule? Or will he follow the call of all Egyptians irrespective of their allegiances and trace the course for a more moderate form of Islamic rule bound to appease important sectors of Egyptian society who voted for his rival Ahmad Shafiq, Mubarak’s last prime minister? The reality is that the army is the arbitrator and the guarantor of the future stability of Egypt. How will the generals play their hand now to ensure that the revolution achieves its noble long-term objectives? These are the realities of the unfurling chapter of Egypt’s ongoing revolutionary process. The tumult is escalating. The future does not look very bright.
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