The Military council's paradox actions, a potential Salafi threat and el-Baradei's rehabilitation

When about 77% of Egyptians voted YES in the referendum on constitutional amendments on March 19^th, they might have assumed that with adopting the changes the further proceedings would be clear. Reality coukldnt be further from that. The military is now speaking of postponing elections, announcing a constitutional statement that only „includes“ the amendments accepted in the referendum, and is very active in various ways...For example they appointed a committee which is supposed to solve the dispute between the first commitee which drafted the amendments and the second commitee which was established in order to amend the amendments ....Clearly "governing a country" was not part of the training schedule in their boot camps...

Military's actions intransparent and contradictious

Paradoxically enough the Military council is now at parts implementing demands the opposition had voiced before the referendum, such as drafting a constitutional declaration which is supposed to form the legal foundation for the remainder of the transistional period and potponing the parliamentary and presidential elections to a later date. A Foreign Policy Article by Nathan J. Brown draws attention to this paradox development and the Military Council's way of working and (not)communicating.

Religious authorities calling for dialogue, Salafis fighting democracy in grassroots activities

While Pope Shenouda III, the Coptic Pope of Alexandria and Patriarch of the See of St. Mark (whatever this means) and an also among Muslims well respected figure, embraces dialogue with Al-Azhar, the leading Islamic university, and the Salafis, Salafi grassrout activities give reasons to worry about the country's future. Recently the movement had announced to abandon its previous (supposedly) apolitical stance and get involved with political processes.

On Monday AlMasr AlYoum reports Salafis where seen handing out anti-democracy flyers in Cairo. According to the article, the flyers called for people not only to become Salafis but also to refrain from embracing a political order that violates the law of God. Little surprising they call for the return to Sunna and Quran and warn that a secular state (they probably rather mean a secular state with a particular legal order and notion of citizenship, but nevermind these nitty-gritty details) would not differentiate between people who were created with differences. One cannot help but think of women's rights and gender equality here, who obviously are a thorn in the side of many Salafis.

Who's afraid of Salafis?

Also I cannot help to always be slightly amused by the ramblings of extremists, their argumentation often lacking any appeal or simple connection to the thinking of those who are not yet on board anyways. The meshing of religion and politics, the (ab)use of Islam to push for certain political goals is despised in particular by many believers. As I had mentioned in an earlier blogpost there was even critique from within the Muslim Brothers against the instrumentalisation of Islam. Yet, it is really hard to judge how dangerous and how powerful the religious extremists really are. In the MB for example, there's clearly various wings, ranging from a conservative strand to the more liberal reformers. And clearly the MB does not always speak in unity. 

MB youth calling for internal democratisation of the Muslim Brothers

Just recently the Youth of the MB organized a conference which was officially not approved of by the MB's leadership. AlMAsr AlYoum has a very interesting article on the conference. It describes open debate on whether MB should form a party which also reaches out to non-MB or whether thy should stay out of politics completely and instead focus on dawa. Also demands have been voiced to give more authority to the elected body, the Shura Council rather than the guidance committee, an executive body which has led the MB rather autonomously in the last year. Besides the general demands for democratisation of internal organisation, participants also asked for better representation of women and youth within the MB. On the other hand there was an incidence in South Egypt when Salafis reportedly cut off the ear of a coptic teacher, accusing him of facilitating prostitution and referring to Sharia law to justify their self-imposed punishment.

Calls for renewed protests against corruption and loosing the revolution

But not only the religious forces are stepping up their activity. The youth Coalition is calling for another Million men march on Friday, in order to protest that leading figures of the old regime who allegedly are responsible for much suffering before and during the days of revoultion are still running around Egypt voicing their opinion and pledging their innocence in talkshows and other public fora rather than being put in jail.

Also the postponing of court cases against other former NDP leaders might fuel the youth anger. Last weekend, court cases against big former NDP figures were referred back as judge has family ties to one of the accused. The case against former Minister of Trade and Industry Rashid Mohamed Rashid, and steel magnate Ahmed Ezz was supposed to be opened on Sunday, but due to family affiliations had to be postponed. Also, the 6th April movement calls for new protests against corruption.

Wiki-Leaked cable likely to boost El-Baradei's standing in Egypt

Meanwhile a wiki leaks released cable is likely to boost elBaradei's standing in Egypt. The cable basically states that US officials where unhappy with Baradei in the last year of his term as head of the IAEA. The Daily Telegraph reported on this issue already on the 9^th of February, in essence displaying it as a disagreement of the US and ElBaradei on how to proceed with Syria and Iran, but also depicting ElBaradei as kind of out of touch with reality and self-centred. The Egyptian Daily News and AlMasr AlYoum on the other hand picked it up just now in its online coverage

In the respective articles, Daily News and AlMasr AlYoum read the cable as stating that Baradei was problematic „because he supports the views of developing countries on the Middle East and other issues.“ Considering that to many Egyptians elBaradei is too much Westernized, „not an Egyptian“ and has paved the way for the war on an Arab country, Iraq, with his work for the IAEA, a beneficial reading of the cable might well rehabilitate him in the eyes of some.

The current situation in Egypt: battle against the remnants of the old regime reaching Cairo's universities

Egypt saw small Scale protest on Friday. In Cairo protesters were voicing various concerns ranging from the demands to clean the state media from corruption to protest against the pending law banning demonstrations and drawing attention to specific incidences of violence against copts. Even when the crowds from the two main sites of protest Midan Tahrir and Maspero, the state television building joined forces they were not more than 1400 according to The Daily News Egypt.

The Situation in Egypt: ongoing protest on a small scale

In Alexandria things got rough with secular protesters reportedly clashing with Salafists who have become increasingly outspoken and politically organized. 

Arrests of protestors by military and military police continue but the good news is that (at least English) online news sources keep reporting. Yet there is fears (which I share) that the new law, banning protests that „disrupt“ order will provide the legal grounds for much harsher reactions towards protesters and eventually aims at the subduing of any public demonstrations. 

Arrests continuing, new law banning protests causing irritation

The government however denies that the law was meant to inhibit any form of protest. According to Ahram Online „The new anti-strike law does not prohibit strikes and protests, Minister of Justice Ahmed El-Guindy told a press conference today.“ They cite El-Gunidy as having said „We as a government believe in the right to protest as long as it does not disrupt work, cause chaos and are held through legitimate channels“. I wonder whether any has ever told El-Gunidy and his fellows in the Ministry of Justice that disrupting work lies in the logic of strikes, which should nonetheless be considered as legitimate channels of protests. Just more evidence of how important political education is now – even on the highest levels...

Events at Cairo's universities as mirror of wider societal developments

The strange mixture of hope and disapointment, of ignorance and activism is also marking the elections for the Students Union of Cairo University, as an article by AlMasr AlYoum shows (quite extensive but makes for a good read!)

Student Union elections at Cairo University amidst military crackdown on protests

In general one could well say that the events at one of Egypt's most important universities are a mirror of what's going on in the country as a whole: strikes and protests had been going on for weeks, in an attempt to oust those who have been leading the university for years and are thus affiliated with the old regime. While those who demand the instant dismissal of high ranking university officials aspire a completely new start, others prefer a step-by-step approach, leaving more space for people to adjust to changes and pursue their business respectively studies. As happening in other spots, the army reacted with force, cracking down violently on peaceful protestors Wednesday night and arresting students as well as staff who had joined the protests. This of course was condemned by human rights groups and triggered further protests, increasing the numbers, but still not being outrageous enough to mobilize decisive amounts of people.

Head start of established parties and groups tainting fairness in elections

Elections are held, and they seem to satsify at least more or less the standards of being free – yet there's a large question mark as for fairness. The starting points for different competitors (being it parties or individuals) are simply too different to guarantee a fair race. Some of the competitors enjoy considerable advance over others, depending on their relation to the old regime.

Which way this relation plays out in the individual cases is very complicated. Take the most famous group, the MB as an example: on the one hand the regime constantly oppressed the MB and thus prevented them from registering as official political party and from gaining the adequate representation in parliament – yet on the other hand the oppression through the regime had provided the MB with the possibility to protray itself as the regime's victim, endowing it with considerable martyr-legitimacy which is now quickly vaning.

German University Cairo expelling students for protests

The GUC, German University of Cairo has become another battle ground for the confrontation of revolutionary youth and the remnants of the old regime. The students of GUC's longstanding call for a student union has been rebutted in the past with the argument that dragging the university into a political confrontation, or respectively making the university campus a political battleground must be avoided. January 25 now revived the students's claim for improved study conditions, better representation and more participation in decision making. Yet the university's leadership did not abandon their former stance and even called the military in to end students' protests. As a means of last resort the GUC eventually suspended some 30 students from university, asking their parents to refer them to a different university as the student's behavior had „violated the university’s values and norms“. I do not think any further comment is needed here....

Egyptians facing an overwhelming amount of information, problems, challenges

Al Ahram as well as Daily News Egypt have been reporting on the issue, as did Caravan, the AUC student magazin. The incidence even reached some German media – yet as we know media attention quickly shifts to new and more dramatic (if deadly) events. Also one has to admit that in Egypt too many things are going on, so one hardly knows where to start with reporting and getting activity. Yet, I am somehow optimistic that – considering how much the January 25 revolution set people here in Egypt in motion – there will be people addressing the various issues. So if everyone just gets engaged with what is most important and dear to him or her, we should be fine....inshallah.... Yet: the battles currently being waged in Egypt's universities could be considered one of the central fights for a new Egypt. Protester's at Cairo University are making this explicit: they are also fighting for a different kind of education. 

Complete failure of the educational system

It is clear to a surprising number of Egyptians that their educational system is a huge failor in so far as it does not educate people to become independent and critical thinkers capable of processing information, acquiring and applying knowledge and skills. Instead what is demanded, encouraged and rewarded is the thoughtless and literal reproduction of that which is written in textbooks. In conversations with me various people have used drastic metaphors describing the final exams for example as the act of „puking the information on the paper“. To many Egyptians this kind of (non)education clearly constituted one of the headstones of the old regime's stability. And similarly many recognize the urgent need to change education in order to form responsible citizens. Thus the developments at Egypt's universities and in the cultural and educational field deserve our attention at least as much as economic and military policies do .

Some headlines from Egypt

As the dear reader might have noticed the activity on this blog has been decreasing - the reason is not that Egypt has overnight become an immaculate democracy (not even one of Putin style), unfortunately not. Simply: I have been caught up in my research and some other apolitical things (private life if you want so...), as this might not gonna change soon I at least wanted to point out to you the most important developments:

On Wednesday the government under Prime Minister Sharaf has passed a law prohibiting protest and strikes at large. Some of the Tahrir people might regret now having welcomed Sharaf so warmly when he substituted the hated Shafiq....and of course protests against the no-protest-law have already been called for...

Those students who had been demonstrating by the means of a peaceful sit-in had had the chance to gain an idea of what this new style of government and army might look like: on Wednesday the military cracked down on protestors, which instantly triggered the condemnation of certain human rights groups...Yet there still seems to be some hope: in reaction to this event much larger numbers turned out on Thursday to maintain the protest at university.

Breaking: Ministry of Interior on Fire

From my living room window I can see thick black clouds over downtown ... Twitter says the smoke stems from a fire in the Ministry of Interior building....my flatmate says Twitter reported earlier today that demonstrations in front of the MOI were marked by a very aggressive atmosphere...

The day at the polling stations in Agouza and Dokki - Part II

Before my talkative interlocutor could tell me why exactly his friends advised him not to quit his job at Exxon Mobile, his phone rang and I had the change to sneak over to the two men whom I had been observing taking notes. Unfortunately it proved rather hard for me to figure out what exactly they were doing as my Arabic is not good (at least when it comes to political vocabulary...as you can imagine referendum, election, judicial supervision of polling, constitutional reform committee and the like had not been used frequently in Egypt two years ago when I studied the Colloquial Arabic here) and their English was non-existent. Yet, other than me they were very steadfast. - Maybe that's what you become when you are an Egyptian socialist living in Mubarak's pseudo-neoliberal oligopoly, having engaged yourself as an election observer in a notoriously rigged system and now having been campaign out on Midan Tahrir since January 25^th...

Persistent Marxists and queuing Egyptians

Alhamdulillah they didn't give up on me, made an incredible effort to explain their purpose to me and even invited me to join them watch their work in the polling stations. The more adamant Marxist of the two, Hussein, whose parents had sent him to the religious alAzhar school (rarely heard of a better example for parents' efforts misfiring..), was so kind to convince me that I could without any fear enter the school building to get a close up of the processes there: Upstairs men and women were queuing in two separate lines, which in Britain could not have been more neatly drawn. The line for men was much longer at that point, running around the whole corridor of the first floor, its end reaching into a classroom, where the newcomers gathered before they could start queuing. While the last men might have well waited for a couple of hours, the women were better off with their line being shorter. Many of them had already come from Zamalek, where they had first tried their luck, only to find the one polling station in the upscale neighbourhood of Zamalek incredibly crowded.

The group of Zamalek women had all come to vote NO. They thought it was time for a complete overhaul of the system, with the constitution being part of it. Also, they were convinced there was no reason to hurry. Instead giving the whole process of drafting a constitution, establishing parties and preparing elections more time and allow people to breathe a bit would be more likely to secure the revolution's achievements and fulfil people's hopes. One of the women, herself being 34 years of age and having her cute little daughter with her, told me that her daughter came with her to observe history. Being able to cast a meaningful vote for the first time in her life constituted the first tangible outcome of the Jan 25 Revolution.

Girls are making history

Yet, the ladies were worried: a lot of people, especially those with little education might go for a YES, simply because they are told to do so. Also, there was rising fear of fraud, early on, various tweeds had called on people to doublecheck whether their ballott paper is stamped – only then would it be official and counted. In many polling stations however, a large amount of the ballot papers had not been stamped. The mother of one of the Zamalek ladies had told her daughter on the phone that at her polling station only about one paper out of ten had been stamped...the number of incidences with unstamped voting paper was such that in the afternoon the supreme judiciary committee supervising the referendum announced that papers would be counted irrespective of the existence of a stamp...

While the school had been relatively calm when I arrived, more and more people were flocking in, when I arrived at the second polling station around noon, it was packed already with more voters streaming in. Twitter, emails and news reported of long queues from the morning on. In the already mentioned Zamalek school people eventually gave up, while in many other cases people waited patiently even for several hours. Having seen how many people had shown up in the (not very popular) morning hours, I found it hardly surprising that in the early afternoon the officials announced to postpone the closing of the polling stations from 7 pm to 9 pm. Later in the evening it was even announced they' d remain open until midnight. 

Logistical problems and pink fingers

Left aside the lack of facilities to meet the needs of the high turnout, the whole logistics of the referendum was better than I had expected: Egyptians where allowed to vote in polling stations all over the country, irrespective of their residency. The schools were well staffed with plenty personnel to check Ids, register voters and hand out the voting papers. On the walls posters were explaining the various steps of voting, and as I had written in my earlier post an online search engine helped to find the closest polling station. 

Yet, the technicalities of the eletcion process were far less advanced than in Europe: whoever showed his ID received a voting paper, his or her name was then written by hand into the register, which consisted of several huge books, the secrecy of the vote should be ensured by pieces of garment, sticked to the wall as curtains in each corner of the room. no comparison with lists of voters or anything similar could take place, the only way to ensure that one person would not vote several times was to ditch one of her fingers into pink ink.

The pink finger today became an icon of the new Egypt, and produced very creative tweeds therefore:

LamiaMoussa:This is a day to remember,isn't it? The day Egyptian men weren't only happy but proud 2 have pink on! #PinkFinger #Dostor2011

JazKhalifa: Since the revolution began i check ppls hands on the streets 4 weapons.... Today I'm checking for pink fingers (: #Dostor2011

safister: I feel so left out. I didn't take a picture next to a tank and I didn't take a picture of my pink finger. #ForeverAlone #Egypt #Dostor2011

taimouro Goodnight Pink fingered population! #Democracy #BetterEgypt #Dostor2011 #Ebda2BeNafsak

One of the first things I encountered at polling station number I was a veiled woman, who – with a big smile on her face – held her pink finger up to me so I could see better she had just proudly satisfied her duty as a citizen. One of the last things I saw shortly before I left polling station number two, was a bunch of Christian girls and boys demonstrating and discussing with excitement the newly discovered fact that by use of the omnipresent wipers one could easily wipe off the pink ink. Soon the joke who'd go and vote for a second time would make the round...

Fear of fraud and military abuse of prisoners

Yet, to my two newly found friends who had been trained by a local NGO how to survey elections, this did not seem to come as a surprise: they had seen much worse in former elections and they were convinced that – no matter what the outcome might be - the fact that so many Egyptians (some news speak of 60% now) showed up, demonstrating their interest and awareness and their willingness to shape the country's future, was the guarantee for positive developments and steps in the right direction. The group of young Christians wasn't so sure about this, and after the observer's account of today's irregularities they seemed in doubt whether there had been any point in voting at all today.

For better or worse Hussein then also told them about the suspicious role of the military, who since last week is faced with charges of serious torture and abuse and has kept a large amount of protesters in custody since March 09. To my surprise none of this group of 10 had previously heard about the incidents. (Of course I instantly recommended them my blog to catch up with the recent developments.)

Many other people I spoke to were much more hopeful. From the many conversations I had today let me just refer three to you: At the first polling station someone (who said NO herself) noted that even if the majority voted for YES, the NO camp would take it to the streets again to push through their vision. She's got a point there, and as I was reflecting on it I realized: the reported indications and allegations of fraud or non-satisfactory logistics as well as the MB/NDP attempts to taking illegitimate influence on voter's decisions open up the possibility to devalue any result and attribute it to the failures in and unfairness of procedures.

Everyone talks politics today and many prove: Egyptians are smart

Later at night I spoke to three men working at a mobile phone shop. All of them had pink fingers and when I asked where more than happy to speak with me about the referendum. All of them had voted yes because in their opinion they country was stalled right now. In their opinion, Hizb AlWatani, the NDP, did not play a role anymore, and even if the MB came to dominate the next parliament: a new constitution drafted by a 100 member committee was in any case better than one written by the army. And if the people eventually didn't like the new constitution, they could then simply say no in the referendum on the new constitution as foreseen by amended article 189.

When we were heading away from the school, a veiled senior lady told us to go and vote. When I told her I wasn't allowed to she engaged in a short conversation with me and told me she would vote for sure NO: „Girl, I am 65 years old, we know they are cheating on us, they are betraying us and planning something, hidden under the table.“ If it wasn't for all the other smart, determined and excited Egyptians I met today, this resolute lady would have been enough to make me optimistic.

For the German-speakers among you: guest post to AlSharq

Today I've written my first post for Al Sharq, a German blog covering events in the MENA region: 

Referendum über Verfassungsänderung in Ägypten – Revolution Schritt II

(all in German though...)

My finger is pink and my head held high – 1st real election in lifetime for many

(From Twitter: @SaraFarag "My finger is pink and my head held high") 

Since 8:38 am this morning my inbox good flooded with emails by members of the mailinglist „constitutionaldebate“: the first one was by Tarek saying that people should get moving as polling stations were already filling up quickly. His mail was soon answered by more than 45 people, who recorded they had been voting and who informed about the length of the queues at different polling stations, and who as well simply wanted to share their pride. And that's the word of the day: PRIDE

If you skim through twitter or news sites, if you look at and speak to the people at the polling stations, it's pride that you see and hear – and feel. This post might be much more „feely“ than previous ones, but I can't help it: I am so moved! I am so moved by what I've seen today! I went out right after I read through the first mails and did the usual media checkup on Lybia. (Japan has fallen off my personal media-cliff, I know the situation there is horrible, and definitely worth following, yet I justify my ignorance to myself by telling me that there is surely other people taking care of it. Focusing on the MENA region, even on Egypt alone, these days means taking in an incredible, overwhelming amount of input on a daily basis anyways.)

Thanks to a government website that was listing all the polling stations, neatly indicated on a google map it was easy for me to find the polling station which is closest to my house. Only about five minutes away, it is – as all of the polling stations – located at a school. Even if it wasn't saturday schools would have been empty as the military council had announced a national holiday for today, in order to allow people to go and vote. I placed inself in front of the school gate in the shade of a bridge to shelter myself from the sun which even in the morning, it was only around 10 am them, is quite strong now as summer is drawing closer.

While I was watching a lot of people passed buy, and entered the gate to disappear in the school building. A camera team of a Saudi Channel was positioned in the courtyard, as were two men speaking to people and taking notes. Other Egyptians were sitting on benches or just standing around, chatting, while more people kept coming in. Those who were leaving the building were easily recognizable as those having cast their vote already by their one pink finger. In order to prevent people from voting twice, people stick their finger into pink ink. In those polling stations I visited they didnt care which finger one used as the marking finger – maybe they didn't care as they knew how futile the whole ink-endeavour was, anyways? But this only became clear to me later...

For the time being I was watching from outside the gate, taking note that the majority of newcomers where women, people were of all ages and from all walks of life. I saw families who came to vote together, groups of youths, friends showing up together, many couples – young and old. At this polling station women were wearing a veil covering their hair (hijab) or unveiled, hardly anyone was wearing a niqab (full veil) at this location. I observed people in neat Western-style clothes such as poloshirts and jeans as well as men in the traditional gallabeyyas. One of them – whom I'd later see again in an akhwa in my neighbourhood – was even wearing the traditional headcover for men, arriving on his run-down carrier-bike usually used to transport bread or other food, while many others were instantly pulling their blackberries once they had voted to share the news with friends and family.

The gate was secured by a police officer and a military police guy with an automatic rifle...yet the soldier looked rather kind, and when I addressed the police officer both of them were readily answering a couple of questions to me. When another police officer waved at me so I could come over and speak to him, I was – as usual - preparing for some uncomfortable enquiry of the kind I've seen and experienced often enough in the past. (Nothing bad, just suspicion, a look, some gestures, questions and eventually orders that make clear to you that no one - especially not a foreigner - is supposed to observe anything that's going on - especially not if the location has police there and might in the slightest sense be related to anything political.) Yet, he just asked me what I was doing there, why I wasn't coming in. And to my surprise, even when he understood I wasnt allowed to vote, he nonetheless asked me to enter and said of course that wouldnt be a problem at all. WTF?!

You cannot imagine my surprise ( I guess you maybe can if you've been in a police state before...). I was prepared for getting chased away again by another, higher officer, but nothing happened. Instead the cameraman instantly addressed me to chat with me, just as some more senior man who had been standing in the courtyard talking to the film team. Besides his lifestory and those of his sons he also let me know (only when I was pushing really hard for some more actual information) that he had not made up his mind yet whether to vote YES or NO. So he was hanging out there to hear people's arguments pro and con – and to tell his lifestory to anyone who wouldn't run fast enough....

Two of his neighbours than engaged him in a discussion, in the wake of which they told him that they were voting YES because they wanted to get the military out of politics as soon as possible. But also because everyone who said NO was for the abolishment of article two in the new constitution. Article 2 states that Egypt is an Islamic country. While it is true that those who want a secular constitution would rather vote for NO, there is no reason to assume that the causal relation exists also in the opposite direction. Yet – as far as Egyptian media and Twitter report, many Imams have used the Friday prayers to put forward exactly this screwed argumentation. Not without further enforcing their point of view by stating it was a religious duty to vote YES....

The Moslem Brother meanwhile have come under considerable fire from the media and activists – and also by many religious Egyptians and MB members themselves! - because they allegedly declared approval of the amendments a religious duty.The MB keep pushing for a YES, but saw the need to distance themselves from the aforementioned instrumentalisation of religion which in particular alienates believers. 

Yet, during the day, there has been reports of religious propaganda being spread at polling stations. Also, in the run up to the referendum NDP's traditional means of bribing people to vote YES have been observed. Several other issues might have hampered the fairness of the process and the representativity of the results. I will write more about that later ….