The future of Egypt’s revolution

The revolution was genuine and will prevail, but under the watchful eye of the armed forces.

Revolution is like Saturn, it devours its own children — Georg Büchner

President Hosni Mubarak is gone, having handed over governance of Egypt to the generals. They, in turn, have abrogated the constitution, dissolved parliament, asked the present cabinet to continue, held meetings with representatives of the protesters, promised to have a referendum on a new constitution within two months and to hold elections within six months or whenever the election preparations are complete. Through a mixture of persuasion and coercion, they have cleared Tahrir Square and appealed to all Egyptians to return to work. For the outside world, they have pledged that treaties and other international obligations will be honoured and that, pending elections, 75-year-old Field Marshal Tantawi, derisively referred to in WikiLeaks documents by other army officers as “Mubarak’s poodle”, will be head of state. The question is, how does the street view the army’s actions?

Many on the streets and in the world are cynical about the army’s intentions. They believe that Mubarak was the figurehead kept in place to perpetuate army rule. The army itself created the situation where he could be eased out because he was thinking of handing over power to his civilian son or to continue in power himself.

Three things seem to support this thesis. First, the army has kept in office the cabinet that Mubarak had appointed, has included no civilians in the top military council, has not lifted the emergency law and has not dissolved the Mubarak-created National Democratic Party (NDP). Second, the army has negotiated with representatives of the protesters but has apparently turned down suggestions that the negotiators include Mohammad Elbaradei as one of the lead figures. Third, it has talked of holding elections within six months and revising the constitution within 10 days, clearly an impossible task.

The continuation of the present cabinet, despite the arrests of three ministers accused of corruption, certainly suggests to the suspicious protesters that it is a case of ‘plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose’ (the more things change, the more they stay the same). But this is not necessarily true. The changes that Mubarak introduced in his cabinet retained some loyalists but also brought in some technocrats, such as Finance Minister Samir Radwan, a former senior economist at the International Labour Organization. Even when revolutionary fervour is high, a measure of continuity is needed. It is likely that in the near future, the cabinet will be revised to include other civilians more closely associated with the protest movement and less with the known ‘establishment’. If the military is wise, it will appoint people who are technocrats and who foreswear any further political ambitions.

There is some weight to be attached to the plea that emergency will be lifted once circumstances permit. The truth is that currently unions and non-unionised workers are out on the street, demanding wage increases and improved conditions that the battered economy cannot possibly afford. The grim prospect of the use of emergency powers to bring this to an end is very real. Its impact can be mitigated if workers demands on such matters, such as dismissing and prosecuting corrupt managers etc and doing away with arbitrary powers to dismiss workers etc, are met. But since the emergency forbids assembly of more than three people, it must be lifted at least six months before elections if political activity is to be meaningful.

Choosing to negotiate with protest leaders who have had no connection with the establishment in the past may seem to suggest that the army does not want to involve people with experience. But it is also likely that such people have political ambitions — Elbaradei and Amr Moussa are both likely candidates for presidential elections, as and when they are held, and their participation in an interim government would be problematic.

The most pressing problem is the revision of the constitution and the holding of elections. While the composition of the committee to revise the constitution has been generally welcomed, it is led by a known opponent of the Mubarak regime and includes a Muslim Brotherhood member whose credentials as a legal expert are recognised by the secularists. Also, the formidable task cannot be completed in 10 days, more time will be needed. By the same token, the elections certainly cannot be held in a country that has no independent election commission and in which there are no rules governing donations to political parties or other matters and in which political activity has been more or less at a standstill for the last 60 years. If elections were to be held within the specified time frame, the only parties that could possibly participate in a coherent manner would be the Ikhwan ul Muslimeen and the discredited NDP. In these circumstances, only the Ikhwan could win.

The armed forces, it is said, are not necessarily united and there may be some who do want to ensure that any civilian administration that they bring into being remains squarely under their thumb. My own feeling, however, is that the armed forces do not need to fear too great an erosion of their power even if a truly democratic system emerges. They are too powerful a force. Importantly, they want to maintain a measure of popular acclaim even while they consume an inordinately high proportion of the country’s resources and this they cannot do if they are seen as being directly responsible for an economy that, for some time to come, will be in dire straits.

What is therefore likely is that we will, shortly, have announcements of the formation of new committees to draw up election laws and laws to govern the setting up of political parties and their financing. In the meanwhile, there will also be a purging of corrupt administrators and an acceptance of offers by western governments to freeze assets of Egyptian officials.

The revolution, it seems to me, was genuine and it will prevail but, unless it is set on devouring its own children, will do so under the watchful eye of the armed forces who will work assiduously to keep western aid flowing and, perhaps, even allow a greater part of it to flow towards economic development and towards meeting the demands of the 40 per cent Egyptians who live below the poverty line.

Will Libya and Algeria be next? (Bahrain falls, for many reasons, in a different category, even though that is where the most serious incidents have happened.) The possibility is strong. Will this spread to non-Arab Muslim countries? Again, the possibility cannot be ruled out.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 22^nd, 2011.