by Sherif Alaa*
At a first glance,
the title looks sarcastic or an oxymoron; but it is not.
Do
Egyptians want democracy? My very simple, short and shocking answer
is 'No'. People did not revolt for democracy, and people do not
believe in democracy. Here I'm not talking about the entire
population certainly, but I feel confident enough to talk about the
vast majority of it.
It is true that the first massive protest of
the revolution (on January 25th 2011) was sparked by young middle
class citizens who believe in democracy, human rights, rule of law,
political participation, accountability and social justice. However,
these few thousand people could not have ousted Mubarak
single-handedly. The popular support was essentially, in my judgment,
for social justice, improving quality of life and protesting against
blatant brutal police practices. People never found the relationship
between politics and economics, or between ballot boxes and bread.
They never thought that there is a direct link between political and
social reform, and dealt with the two issues separately.
Implanting
Intolerance
For decades the Egyptian regime has been investing in
ignorance, preparing generations of illiterate people, or poorly
unqualified 'educated' people. Since the 1970s, at least, sectarian
strife has always been a successful card to play by the regime. For
decades the state has been spoon-feeding intolerance to Egyptians at
home, school, mosques, churches, workplaces and in the media.
One
day as I was walking my dog in an upper-class neighbourhood in Cairo
8 years ago, a 7 year-old kid stopped me to ask a question that I can
never forget: 'Excuse me sir, is your dog Muslim or Christian?'. The
kid was wearing the uniform of one of Cairo's most expensive
high-quality international language schools. I was shocked by his
question, maybe he was not taught about that at school, but it is
impossible to disregard the effect of other institutions, including
the family, on shaping the kid’s mentality.
People have been
obsessed with religion because it was their only way out. A lot of
the unprivileged people gave up wishing for a better present or
future and therefore have decided to live their life as a transition
phase before going to the ultimate final destination. They cannot
afford being tortured in life and then again in hell; this is exactly
why they inject religion in all aspects of their lives in order to
peacefully rest in heaven. The only support these people found was
from clergymen and religious charity organisations and therefore it
is not odd to blindly follow the only people who gave them hope, and
food.
The majority of Egyptians do not believe in human
rights, or at least as stipulated in the Universal Declaration for
Human Rights and in international human rights law in general. They
do not sympathise with torture victims as long as ‘they deserve
it’. They even refuse to call them victims if these torture victims
were found guilty with theft or any other crime or offense. People do
not recognise genuine freedom of belief and thought. Parents use
violence against kids, and ask teachers to use violence against their
own kids at school. Husbands inflict violence on their wives, who in
turn encourage their sons to use violence against their sisters. The
majority of Egyptians do not believe in equality between men and
women, Muslims and Christians, the educated and the uneducated, the
rich and the poor.
Egyptians prefer stability and order over
democracy. Unfortunately democracy and elections are synonyms in
Egypt. A lot of arguments are being used to justify the undemocratic
practices by the regime. The current president has the right to be a
dictator because he was ‘democratically’ elected. He has the
right to use violence against protesters because people voted for
him. The constitution was written by one group, led by one political
party because the elected parliament chose them. Such arguments
constitute a conceptual disaster in fact.
With ignorance comes
brainwashing and conspiracies. If you oppose Mubarak you’re paid by
the Americans to overthrow him because Americans hate Egypt. If you
oppose Morsi you’re also paid by the Americans to overthrow him
because Americans hate Islam. Can any of the people who argue this
silly hypothesis think for 20 seconds before uttering these words? I
highly doubt it. Don’t they know that Mubarak was one of America’s
best friends in the region? They do not know that what the American
President, Franklin Roosevelt, said about Samoza, the dictator of
Nicaragua, applies on Mubarak as well. Roosevelt in 1939 said about
him ‘Samoza may be a son of a bitch, but he’s our son of a
bitch.’
Missing the Old Dictator?
A country like Egypt
lacks institutions, rule of law, and civic culture. The majority of
the people are poor, and the gap between the upper class and the
lower class is widening one day after the other, and the middle class
is almost demolished. Since the independence six decades ago,
Egyptians have known only the rule of the man with the gun; i.e. the
army. Before that, it was the rule of the foreign man with the gun;
i.e. foreign occupation.
It is no secret that a big bulk of
Morsi’s opponents today, whether the elite or the people, are
pro-Mubarak and pro-military rule. They openly admit that they were
against the revolution and that Mubarak was a great leader. Others
call upon the army to intervene by a military coup to ‘save the
country’. This clearly indicates that they are not revolting for
democracy; they simply do not like the new dictator and they miss
their old dictator. It could be Stockholm syndrome, or it could be
that they do not know any better. Mubarak ruled the country for 30
years. An entire generation, including myself, did not know any other
president.
Now what? Three Possible Scenarios
Some could
argue that Egypt is now witnessing ‘unprecedented freedom’, but
this is not true. What is true is that now people protest, write
against the regime, make satire TV shows and form political parties.
But on the other hand, protesters get shot and stripped off, writers
are prosecuted, newspapers and TV channels are shut down and
political leaders are targeted.
Freedom is to express your
opinion or join a party without fear of prosecution or getting
killed. Furthermore, the state as an institution is getting weaker
than ever. Egypt’s ranking in the Failed States Index is the worst
in history. Riots, looting, protesting, killing and all forms of
violence take place every day. Of course this cannot continue
forever; it has to eventually come to an end; but how and when…this
is the question.
The current events show that extreme violence
by the security apparatus will not be able to oppress the masses. I
argue that this is the main advantage of the revolution; breaking the
silence and fear. Therefore the only available options are
containment of the crisis by the regime, holding early elections or
overthrowing the regime.
In the case of containing the crisis,
the scene would be relatively calmer; fewer protests with smaller
number of protesters, some liberals would be appointed as members and
consultants, some gradual social reform would take place and less
blatant violence by the security apparatus. If the Muslim
Brotherhood’s regime shows enough resilience to be able to wisely
cope with the popular pressure, it would become stronger and would be
able to gradually and officially transform Egypt into a pro-West
Sunni version of Iran. But in case this containment is temporary and
inefficient, then masses would be triggered to protest by the
smallest mistake.
In the unlikely event that Morsi voluntarily
accepts holding early presidential elections, the Muslim
Brotherhood’s candidate could actually win again. At least it will
be an electoral contestation between the Muslim Brotherhood and more
radical Salafis who are also disappointed with Morsi for being less
radical than they expected from an Islamist president. It is very
unlikely also that a secular candidate would win or even make it to
the runoff due to the fact that religion is the biggest source of
legitimacy for rulers in Egypt. Furthermore, secular opposition is
not united and it is very difficult that all of them would support
one candidate. In addition, defaming campaigns that target spreading
rumours and lies about secular politicians are quite effective. This
scenario will anyway lead to the current scene, whether the winner is
from the Muslim Brotherhood, the more radical right wing or even the
secular bloc that does not have a chance. The newly elected president
would argue that only he (of course it is a ‘he’ in a society
like Egypt) represents the people’s will, even if he wins with a 1
per cent difference.
The third and last option is overthrowing
the regime; I think this is the scenario that is most likely going to
happen. This could happen either through Morsi’s voluntarily
stepping down if millions remain in the street, or forcibly through a
coup d’état. If Morsi voluntarily stepped down that would only
happen after taking all measures to please, appease and/or oppress
the angry masses. Probably this ‘voluntary’ resignation would
happen after an ugly bloody scene by the security forces and the
Muslim Brotherhood supporters. The army would then have to intervene
again; otherwise the country will go to what looks like a civil war.
This looks like the same outcome of a military coup.
In this case,
the 2011 scenario will not happen again, and the Muslim Brotherhood
will not rise to power; neither will the secular liberal opposition.
In this scenario the military will openly have all authorities and
will take full control over the country to restore order. But for
US-aid purposes, this could happen through a military-controlled
‘puppet’. A great deal of today’s opposition will be satisfied,
as mentioned before they were calling for this intervention and they
were not revolting for democracy. But some of the protesters would
still oppose military authoritarianism, but in this case the army has
legitimacy by saving the country from a civil war. Martial law would
be enforced; thousands of Islamists- and maybe some seculars- would
be arrested amidst popular support. The new ruler would then have to
take certain measures regarding social and economic reform. The
military is the country’s only intact (or quasi-intact) institution
and is indeed capable of implementing such reform. A modern replica
of Nasser’s reforms in the 1950s would take place and that would
appease the majority of Egypt’s working and lower class. A
relatively fair minimum wage law would be drafted, more jobs for the
unemployed would be provided, and improvements in healthcare and
pension for the elderly would take place. This of course would take
several months after Morsi is toppled. The new military, or
military-controlled, ruler will definitely secure his position and
will gain legitimacy by these measures.
Then how could
democracy be achieved?
It is clear that none of the above
scenarios lead to real democracy. These scenarios either maintain the
status quo or lead to a worse situation. Given all the factors and
variable I mentioned above, I believe that prospects for democracy
have to come from the ruler himself. Democracy will only take place
in Egypt if the ruler wants Egypt to be democratic. Entrenching
democratic values in the people has to come from above; only the
ruler of Egypt has the capacity to make use of all state failed
institutions to direct the people towards democracy. The ruler can
control media, education, religious institutions and even the family
to direct the masses in any direction. It is ironic though that this
ruler will first have to oppress anti-democracy opposition.
History
indeed proves my hypothesis. Look at Nasser’s Egypt vis-à-vis
Sadat’s Egypt. Nasser managed to take the country to an extreme
left, economically and socially. The man managed to make people fall
in love with his version of what he called ‘socialism’, to look
at the Americans as exploitive capitalists and to want war with
Israel. Nasser was also very secular as well as socially progressive,
calling for women participation in the society and encouraging them
to have careers other than raising their kids. Movies of his era
always portrayed successful women who fought the society to achieve
their goals.
On the contrary, in a matter of a few years
Sadat managed to shift the country to the other extreme; from war to
peace with Israel, from the Eastern bloc to the Western bloc (though
officially remained non-aligned) and from socialism to open-market
economy. Although Nasser left a legacy, but Egypt’s relative
success in the 1973 war and Sadat’s use of religion managed to give
him credit at least to the mainstream; i.e. the majority. During
Sadat’s rule people and clergymen started to argue how ill-gotten
(Haram) working of women is. The society did drastically change in
less than one decade.
On a final note, I believe that only
through the political will of the leadership Egypt can move forward
toward modern democracy, given that this leadership maintains
legitimacy and stability through real social reform that people can
see and relate to in their everyday life.
*Sherif Alaa: Egyptian political researcher.
**This piece was written in Feb. 2013
