I have had an affinity towards the Egyptian people and their
fight for a government that is of, by and for the Egyptian people. When Obama was on the campaign trail he gave
a speech and stated:
“And understand this: If American workers are being denied their right
to organize and collectively bargain when I’m in the White House, I will put on
a comfortable pair of shoes myself, I will walk on that picket line with you as
President of the United States of America. Because workers deserve to know that
somebody is standing in their corner.”
In January 2011 the Egyptian people protested en masse
calling for the removal of Hosni Mubarak as president and demanded free
democratic elections for the president and the governing body of Egypt .
Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State asked the Egyptian
people to allow for the orderly transition from Mubarak’s regime to Democratic
elections which were scheduled for September.
"We
want to see this peaceful uprising on the part of the Egyptian people to demand
their rights to be responded to in a very clear, unambiguous way by the
government, and then a process of national dialogue that will lead to the
changes that the Egyptian people seek and that they deserve,"
“Otherwise,
she warned, protesters seeking better opportunity and a stronger political
voice might end up facing further repression from new leaders instead of the
democratic reforms they seek.”
On
Later in mid-February, 2011 protests broke out in
Where were Obama and his comfortable shoes? No where to be found. But in spite of all the upheaval in
Following
the Egyptian Revolution of 2011, and the resignation of President Hosni
Mubarak, executive power was assumed by the Supreme Council of the Armed
Forces, which dissolved the parliament and suspended the constitution.
During
2011 tens of thousands of Egyptians protested in the streets against the
continued military rule and Egypt ’s military rulers agreed to
form a new government and transfer power to a civilian body by July 2012; also the
government would hold parliamentary elections on November 28 and a presidential
election by the end of June 2012.
The
rules for the election were released on January 30, 2012 . Candidates had to be born in Egypt to Egyptian
parents, may not have held dual nationality and may not have been
married to a foreigner. To be nominated, they required the support of 30
Members of Parliament or 30,000 voters. The
formal registration process for candidates started on March 10th and ended on April
8, 2012 .
On 14 April 2012 , the Supreme Presidential Electoral Commission (SPEC)
announced the disqualification of ten candidates, mostly moderate to
liberal. Reasons for the
disqualifications were not given, but the affected candidates were given 48
hours to appeal the decisions. Two of the disqualified candidates, Suleiman and
El-Shater's campaigns stated they would file appeals. All appeals were rejected.
Mohammed ElBaradei had withdrawn
his bid in January of that year citing concerns about the undemocratic way the
military was governing Egypt . Mr. ElBaradei had wanted a new constitution
to be drawn up from scratch before any elections took place.
In April 2012, he took to Twitter calling the transition to democracy
"bungled" and criticizing the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces'
approach to writing a new constitution.
On
April 25th the Supreme Presidential Electoral Commission accepted
the appeal filed by Ahmed Shafik against its previous decision to
exclude him from running for President. The
appeal also requested the new Parliamentary law be brought before the Supreme Constitutional Court to determine its constitutionality, that didn’t happen.
The
Egyptian people didn’t have a real choice in selecting the candidates for
president, just like the American people did not have a choice in the selection
of their candidates for president in 2008, which was decided by the two
parties, Republican and Democrat.
On June 24th, Egypt ’s
election commission announced that Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi had won Egypt 's
presidential runoff. Morsi won by a narrow margin over Ahmed Shafik, who was the
final prime minister under deposed President Hosni Mubarak. The commission said Morsi took 51.7% of the
vote versus 48.3% for Shafik.
There now was a gaping divide between
the Muslim Brotherhood, and the rest of the country; about 48% of voters,
according to the poll, which gave Morsi the presidency with close to 52% of the
popular vote.
Little more than three months into
the four-year term of Morsi's government, the economy was in shambles, the body
politic was barely functioning and the Egyptian people were deeply polarized. The 17 months after Mubarak’s exit had been
unsettling for the Mubarak faithful. But the year since Morsi's inauguration
had been even worse.
By March 2013, serious diplomatic efforts to convince Morsi
to form a government of national unity had failed. Morsi went about making it
even worse by maintaining a Muslim Brotherhood government run by newly promoted
lower-grade officials with bad ideas. The last straw appeared to be the
appointment of the culture minister.
Morsi fired five key cultural figures, and replaced them with
Muslim Brotherhood members including the head of the opera house and the
National Library and Archives. It was
evident he was trying to impose an Islamist agenda on cultural institutions
which had always been secular.
"The economy was being wrecked by the movement. They were spending
at least $1.5bn per month more than they should have. They were using months
and months of reserves at a critical level. You couldn't deny the underlying
trend that the government was heading for bankruptcy”.
"Whatever mess they had created was going to lead to civil revolt.
Soon they wouldn't have been able to pay for civil servants' salaries."
Within a week, citizens
experienced shortages of essentials, especially food and fuel. In Egypt ,
the military owns a significant stake in the gas and oil sector and was always
a guarantor of supply, now there were long lines for fuel.
On the evening of April
15, 2013 a man by the name of Mohammed Abdul Aziz and five other
friends sat in a coffee shop in central Cairo
to plot ways to invigorate Egypt ’s
tired civil opposition.
"In the beginning all we wanted to do was gather petitions to
renounce Morsi," he said. But the group soon got a name, Tamarod (Rebel).
Within weeks it had also gained a momentum that propelled it to centre stage of
a defining period in Egypt
By mid-June, other state institutions were now
sharing the military's alarm; the tide was clearly turning against Morsi.
Tamarod claimed to have received more than 20 million petition signatures.
In late June millions of
Egyptians took to the streets demanding that President Mohamed Morsi step down
immediately in what one military source called "the biggest protest Egypt has seen in its history."
"It was becoming
clear that everything that the state had built, everything that it had stood
on, was coming crumbling down," said Ahmed Badawi, a mid-ranking police
officer who was unhappy to see Mubarak go. "It was a case of 'my enemy's
enemy is my friend, so we joined them in Tahrir Square
From every angle, Morsi was increasingly being seen as, a
captive of his constituency, the Muslim Brotherhood.
Squares across the
country were overwhelmed by the scale of popular participation and energy,
which some say represented possibly the largest political assembly in world
history. CNN reported over 33 million people were out in Egypt on Sunday, or nearly 40 percent of the country, according
to satellite data.
June 30, the date of the first
anniversary of Morsi’s swearing in, was chosen by Tamarod for a march to the
place where it all began, Tahrir Square . By now the shortages were especially severe.
By July 3rd the army had given Morsi the first
ultimatum: find ways to end the crisis within a week. Morsi was unable to meet
that ultimatum and helplessly watched as the large crowds hoped for by the born-again
opposition materialized.
After Morsi was removed from office by the military, things
were relatively stable. The Obama
Administration stood by Morsi calling him democratically elected. But the selection of the candidates to run
for office was rigged.
In 2011, President Obama was quick to demand President Mubarak to step down
and leave office. Obama had supported
Morsi’s close election even though it was rigged.
On July 6th, it was announced that Mohammed ElBaradei
would be named interim prime minister.
The Obama Administration began pressuring the Egyptian Army to return
Morsi to power as he was “democratically elected” and began threatening to call
the overthrow a military coup, meaning aid to Egypt
would be cut off unless Morsi was returned.
ElBaradei is a Nobel peace
Laureate and a former director of the U.N. nuclear watchdog. Mr. ElBaradei leads an alliance of liberal
and left-wing parties, the National Salvation Front.
In 2012 he was running as a
liberal, secular candidate in the presidential elections, but withdrew his bid
in January of that year citing concerns about the undemocratic way the military
was governing Egypt .
ElBaradei's nomination
had been confirmed by several sources and state media but just before midnight a presidential spokesman told reporters that no prime
minister had yet been chosen.
The intense pressure to reject ElBaradei as prime minister appeared to come
from the Obama Administration. President
Obama had declined to press Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi to leave office,
saying that his administration would continue to work with the “democratically
elected government” amid violent protests in ElBaradei was later named interim Vice-President but resigned after an army crackdown on Pro Morsi violent protests resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Egyptians. He is now to be tried for the “betrayal of trust” by the Egyptian army.
“Mohamed
ElBaradei, the Nobel laureate who quit the Egyptian cabinet in protest over
last week’s bloodshed, faces being hauled before the courts after being accused
of a “betrayal of trust”.
Mr. ElBaradei
was a co-leader of the National Salvation Front (NSF), a prominent coalition of
liberal and secular forces which joined the nationwide demonstrations against
the deposed President Mohamed Morsi.
“The case
against him will be heard in a Cairo court next month and is being brought by
Sayyed Ateeq, an Egyptian law professor, according to judicial sources who
spoke to Reuters.
“He was appointed in his capacity as a representative of the
NSF and the majority of the people who signed the Tamarod declaration,” Mr.
Ateeq told Reuters, referring to the grassroots petition movement that had
called for Mr. Morsi to resign”.
“Mr. Ateeq
said Mr. ElBaradei – who left Egypt earlier this week and traveled to Europe –
could face three years in prison if found guilty. But judicial sources said the
maximum sentence is a fine and suspended jail term”.
And now Mubarak has been freed and remains under house arrest. It is so sad to see the Egyptian people, after all their bravery and sacrifices of life and limb to have Mubarak back. It is an outrage that all the world should stand in shame on this day.
And now Mubarak has been freed and remains under house arrest. It is so sad to see the Egyptian people, after all their bravery and sacrifices of life and limb to have Mubarak back. It is an outrage that all the world should stand in shame on this day.
By Patricia Baeten
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