On Thursday, November 22, President Morsi issued a decree. That was no ordinary decree. He called it "a constitutional decree" which, in effect, put him above the law. In the absence of a constitution, Morsi declared that until the new constitution is drafted and ratified, his writ is law. With that, the first popularly elected President of Egypt, a historic byproduct of the January 25, 2011 revolution, in effect, became both the executive and legislative branches of Government. As to the third branch, the judiciary, it was neutralized -no judicial review of his decrees.
Guess who got angry, in fact very angry, without the benefit of anger-management -the judges. They declared a strike. Courts were closed, except for chambers dealing with issues which cannot wait. With that, nearly all other professional associations, including the medical, press, and Bar Associations, went also on strike. Millions poured in Tahrir and similar public squares to denounce their new President whose roots lie deep in the Muslim Brotherhood. Some of the demonstrators went as far as calling him "Mussolini." Others called him "the new Pharaoh."
What is this all about? Prime Minister Qandeel warns "Either we build. Or we shed blood." President Morsi addresses the nation soothingly saying: "I am the President of all Egyptians. My decree is only for 2 to 4 months. It will end with the adoption of the new constitution." Dr. El-Baradei, the oracle for democracy in Egypt announces "A constitution which is rushed out from the Constituent Assembly will be worth the refuse basket." Farouk Gouida, the great intellectual posits that "the Egyptian public shall never again condone any form of the old authoritarianism." And the Chief Editor of Al-Ahram, the official newspaper of the Egyptian government, Abdel-Nasser Salamah, headlines on November 30: "The Egyptian situation may be decided by the intervention of the armed forces." This means a military coup against the New Egypt.
A catastrophe may be on its way. A possible civil war threat hangs over the blue skies of Egypt.
It all began with the Islamists winning 70% of the seats in the post-Mubarak freely-elected Parliament. Of those, 50% for the Muslim Brotherhood -a middle of the road Islamist movement, and 20% for the Salafis, an extreme Islamist group which is heavily influenced by Saudi Arabia's wahabbism. The rest of the seats were won by the liberal parties which include the Copts.
Enters the Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC), towards which the Islamists, including President Morsi, harbor deep mistrust. These venerable judges were not only Mubarak appointees. Their rulings were like high bumps on the Islamists' road to pre-eminence in the governance of the new Egypt. The SCC, finding a technical fault in the elections of the lower house of Parliament, (seats which were to be filled by individuals were grabbed by political parities) dissolved Parliament, except for the upper house (the Shoura).
But with Morsi now at the Presidential Palace in Cairo, he refused to accept that judicial activism. So he called the dissolved Chamber into a 20 minute session for one purpose: to have it vote a transfer of legislative power to him temporarily pending: drafting of the new constitution; voting on it in a referendum; the re-constitution of a new parliament; the definition of the role of the judiciary as a third branch of a democratic system of government.
These moves were not immediately challenged by Egypt's judiciary which, in the new Egypt, has begun to flex its muscles, the muscles of a truly independent judiciary. But the judiciary was not yet done with the Islamists in the new Egypt. The judges had the Constituent Assembly (CA) in their cross-hairs. The battle between the Islamists and the secularists was being waged by the convenient proxy of the judiciary. The CA was dissolved by the SCC before, but its successor CA was handpicked by the Islamists.
The secularists in the new CA (the committee of 100) were the auxiliaries of the SCC. Their lower number on the CA was magnified by a greater clout in Tahrir Square. Thus while the battles of drafting raged on within the confines of the CA, the secularists decided to try to paralyze its rush to the production of a pro-Islamist constitution. They walked out of the meetings of the CA, depriving it at one point, of 25% of its membership.
But a quorum stayed on the job: Article 2 provided that "the principles" of Islamic Law (Sharia) were a principal source of legislation. The Salafis grumbled. "The principles" is a term that does not provide for textual adherence to Islamic law. But the Muslim Brothers in the CA, supported by the secularists including the copts and women, ignored that militant fringe. And Al-Azhar which is represented on the CA gave the secularist wing in the CA a big boost. After all, Al-Azhar stand is that "Islam does not recognize a state based solely on religion."
Now the Supreme Constitutional Court was getting ready to stop the Constituent Assembly in its tracks. By now, the defections from the CA have reached 30%, and the SCC was aiming at dissolving that body, in order to clear the way for the selection by the Shoura (the only Chamber of Parliament which was left standing) of a new body to draft the new constitution.
In that chaotic inter-institutional environment, Morsi, fearful of the void (no Lower Parliamentary Chamber; no constitution) went for an over-reach- a "constitutional declaration." And Egypt exploded, in spite of Morsi's explanation that he only intended to bring the transition to a close. Poetically, he intoned, that it was "a difficult birth from the womb of an ancient nation."
He and the Islamists felt that rushing the draft of the new constitution by the existing CA was the only dam to forestall the mighty waves for the soul of Egypt. On November 30, the battle lines were more than lines in the sand. The judiciary, faced with that grand play for power by Morsi and the Constituent Assembly, decided to close down the courts. Millions poured out on the streets screaming "IRHAL" (Leave) to Morsi, and the violent competition for the soul of Egypt, either secularist or Islamist, was on. "The Great Explosion" was already happening. The millions, from the two opposing forces, were back in Tahrir and in many other squares all over that historic land. And soon flames enveloped many centers of the Muslim Brotherhood.
"The rapacious appropriation of power," the anti-Morsi forces declared, "shall not be allowed to stand."
Friday, November 30, 2012
Friday, November 23, 2012
At Crossroads in Egypt: One Sign Reads: "To All Directions;" The Other Sign Reads: "To All Other Directions"
President Morsi now has it all: Executive, legislative and ... not judiciary, but something else called "absence of judicial review." It happened on Thursday, Nov. 22, a day when the whole world was grateful for that Gaza cease fire. Morsi, the engineer and the first elected president of Egypt since the birth of ancient Egypt, has, with the US managed to stop, at least for now, the senseless carnage between Gazans and Israelis. During those anxious hours of negotiations, the world looked at Morsi as the voice of reason. President Obama spoke to him at length concluding: that man with roots in the Muslim Brotherhood was indeed a pragmatist. The accolades from all over the world rained on Morsi once the fighting stopped.
Then came Thursday, Nov. 22, a fateful day in Egypt's halting march towards democracy: Morsi promulgating a decree granting himself broad powers. Before that decree was issued, the sign reading "To All Directions" signaled a deadlock in the efforts to draft a new constitution. After the issuance of that decree, the sign reading "To All Other Directions" signaled the unknown.
The dilemma is rooted in the following facts: a split between the Islamists who control the majority of parliamentary seats and the secularists; the haggling in the constituent assembly (the Assembly of 100) over the few yet-to-be-drafted articles of the constitution, resulting in the withdrawal of most of the secularists, including the Copts, from those deliberations (about 25% of the membership); and the fear that the Supreme Constitutional Court, whose judges are hold-over Mubarak appointees, was poised to dissolve that constitutional assembly. Members of that Assembly were chosen by the Islamists-dominated and now dissolved parliament.
Was Morsi correct in issuing that decree? "Correct" is a subjective term which is subject to all kinds of interpretations. Those who support Morsi say: that decree is an emergency enactment of limited duration ending with the plebiscite on a new constitution and the setting up of a new parliament vested with full legislative powers.
Morsi opponents claim that Morsi, using his accolades for his role in the Gaza crisis, is assassinating democracy, tipping the delicate scales in favor of the Islamists in whose ideology his roots run deep, and is anointing himself as the new Pharaoh.
Perhaps the reality is buried under a ton of rhetoric and counter-rhetoric. In spite of that situation, a central fact emerges: the two sides of that schism fear a return to the past leading to an early abortion of the January 25 Revolution. However, each side wants to own that revolution, interpreting its progress on the basis of its ideological perspective.
There is another central fact in the battle of reading the signs at that historic Egyptian crossroads. There is no love lost between Morsi and the Supreme Constitutional Court. That Court had dissolved Parliament, only to have Morsi reconvene it for 20 minutes to have it grant him "temporary" legislative powers. Ancillary to the suspected powers of the Supreme Constitutional Court was the suspicion towards the Public Prosecutor, Abdel Meguid Mahmoud, for failing to win stronger sentences against Mubarak and his associates.
So now, President Morsi, who had returned the army to its barracks, has, through the November 23 decree, freed himself, his decrees and the constituent assembly from judicial oversight. Free at last? Not so fast. The battle between the Islamists and the secularists, signalling an open wound in the Egyptian body politic has begun to intensify. Tahrir Square is again the huge podium from which arguments and counter arguments, as well as rocks, tear gas canisters, and more dangerous projectiles, are exchanged.
In response to those who say that Morsi abhors judicial independence, we find Morsi appointing a new Public Prosecutor, Talaat Ibrahim Abdullah, a former leader of the movement for judicial independence under Mubarak.
To those in Egypt who say that Morsi now represents a continuation of the 60 years of dictatorship under which Egypt has suffered, Morsi has addressed his nation on Nov. 23 saying "my actions are for the protection of that revolution."
As the counter-Morsi protesters burned down Muslim Brotherhood offices in Alexandria and elsewhere, in response to the frightening amassing of powers in the hands of one man, Morsi, he responds that he was "the President of all Egyptians."
The masses, while pleased with Morsi's plans to retry Mubarak and his cohorts (against the principles of "res judicata" -the thing has been decided), the opponents still scream that "Morsi wants to make of himself a God."
Al-Sharkawi of Cairo University, an advisor to Morsi says: "This is mainly a political conflict. Egypt needs to move forward. The life of that decree is from 2 to 4 months. Egypt cannot wait anymore. The judiciary did no reflect the will of the people."
For now, I tend to agree. But I was educated in Egypt until the age of 24. There I learnt from my Scottish professors at Zagazig High School in the Province of Sharkiah, a British adage: "Nothing is more permanent that the temporary."
Then came Thursday, Nov. 22, a fateful day in Egypt's halting march towards democracy: Morsi promulgating a decree granting himself broad powers. Before that decree was issued, the sign reading "To All Directions" signaled a deadlock in the efforts to draft a new constitution. After the issuance of that decree, the sign reading "To All Other Directions" signaled the unknown.
The dilemma is rooted in the following facts: a split between the Islamists who control the majority of parliamentary seats and the secularists; the haggling in the constituent assembly (the Assembly of 100) over the few yet-to-be-drafted articles of the constitution, resulting in the withdrawal of most of the secularists, including the Copts, from those deliberations (about 25% of the membership); and the fear that the Supreme Constitutional Court, whose judges are hold-over Mubarak appointees, was poised to dissolve that constitutional assembly. Members of that Assembly were chosen by the Islamists-dominated and now dissolved parliament.
Was Morsi correct in issuing that decree? "Correct" is a subjective term which is subject to all kinds of interpretations. Those who support Morsi say: that decree is an emergency enactment of limited duration ending with the plebiscite on a new constitution and the setting up of a new parliament vested with full legislative powers.
Morsi opponents claim that Morsi, using his accolades for his role in the Gaza crisis, is assassinating democracy, tipping the delicate scales in favor of the Islamists in whose ideology his roots run deep, and is anointing himself as the new Pharaoh.
Perhaps the reality is buried under a ton of rhetoric and counter-rhetoric. In spite of that situation, a central fact emerges: the two sides of that schism fear a return to the past leading to an early abortion of the January 25 Revolution. However, each side wants to own that revolution, interpreting its progress on the basis of its ideological perspective.
There is another central fact in the battle of reading the signs at that historic Egyptian crossroads. There is no love lost between Morsi and the Supreme Constitutional Court. That Court had dissolved Parliament, only to have Morsi reconvene it for 20 minutes to have it grant him "temporary" legislative powers. Ancillary to the suspected powers of the Supreme Constitutional Court was the suspicion towards the Public Prosecutor, Abdel Meguid Mahmoud, for failing to win stronger sentences against Mubarak and his associates.
So now, President Morsi, who had returned the army to its barracks, has, through the November 23 decree, freed himself, his decrees and the constituent assembly from judicial oversight. Free at last? Not so fast. The battle between the Islamists and the secularists, signalling an open wound in the Egyptian body politic has begun to intensify. Tahrir Square is again the huge podium from which arguments and counter arguments, as well as rocks, tear gas canisters, and more dangerous projectiles, are exchanged.
In response to those who say that Morsi abhors judicial independence, we find Morsi appointing a new Public Prosecutor, Talaat Ibrahim Abdullah, a former leader of the movement for judicial independence under Mubarak.
To those in Egypt who say that Morsi now represents a continuation of the 60 years of dictatorship under which Egypt has suffered, Morsi has addressed his nation on Nov. 23 saying "my actions are for the protection of that revolution."
As the counter-Morsi protesters burned down Muslim Brotherhood offices in Alexandria and elsewhere, in response to the frightening amassing of powers in the hands of one man, Morsi, he responds that he was "the President of all Egyptians."
The masses, while pleased with Morsi's plans to retry Mubarak and his cohorts (against the principles of "res judicata" -the thing has been decided), the opponents still scream that "Morsi wants to make of himself a God."
Al-Sharkawi of Cairo University, an advisor to Morsi says: "This is mainly a political conflict. Egypt needs to move forward. The life of that decree is from 2 to 4 months. Egypt cannot wait anymore. The judiciary did no reflect the will of the people."
For now, I tend to agree. But I was educated in Egypt until the age of 24. There I learnt from my Scottish professors at Zagazig High School in the Province of Sharkiah, a British adage: "Nothing is more permanent that the temporary."
Friday, November 16, 2012
From the Pharmacy to the Papacy: Pope Theodoros II of Alexandria
His sure medicine is a dose of love and an equal measure of unity. That is the prescription of His Holiness Pope Theodoros, the 118th Pope of the venerable Orthodox Church of Egypt. He comes to the headship of a very historic Church in the annals of Christendom the first church after Christ. Elevated to that exalted position by a unique election system which goes back 2000 years (a process of selection followed by drawing a lot among four clergymen), the new Pope inherits the mantle of the great Pope Shenouda III.
The date of his elevation to the Papacy was November 4, 2012, his 60th birthday. His Egypt has changed since the revolution of January 25, 2011. A historic change has come to his land, the land of the Copts (Egypt), and so his message is a mixture of love, the creed of that Church which boasts of having the hiding place of the Holy family in Old Cairo, and unity, which has become quite elusive in this age of rage.
Theodoros II has a 1975 baccalaureate in pharmacy from the University of Alexandria. This was followed, ten years later, by a World Health Fellowship from the UK. For His Holiness, it was an 1985 double graduation. In that year, he was also able to graduate from the Coptic Clerical College in Egypt. After a period of seclusion as a monk at the Anba Bishoy Convent in Wadi Al-Natroun in 1986 in the western desert, he was ordained a Coptic priest in 1989. Within 8 years thereafter, he became a Bishop.
This new spiritual leader, whose original name was Wagih Sobhi Baqi Soliman, had a father who was a land surveyor. The family kept on moving in Egypt from east (Mansourah), to south (Souhag), to west (Damanhour). It was as if fate was offering the future Pope a broad look at his beloved Egypt.
On this Pope's shoulders lie the new burdens of remelding the Coptic community into one community with their Muslim brethren. It is not by numbers or a ratio of one Copt to 10 Muslims, forming the demography of 90 millions, the largest Arab State. It is by the shared history which began in the 8th Century since the time of Amre lbn Elass led the Muslims westward from Palestine into the Nile Valley. The new arrivals were under strict instructions from Khaliph Omar who, from Medina in what is now Saudi Arabia, ordered them in no uncertain terms: "No forced conversion. And learn from your brothers, the Copts."
This eventuated into Egypt becoming a model for the Islamic Law persistent call for diversity and respect for the other. But the ill wind of extremism, which cloaked itself in an Islamic garb, began as of the Khomeni revolution in Iran to blow westward blanketing Egypt in its path. Those ominous developments ignored the great patriotic stance of the Coptic church in regard to Egypt's gradual liberation from Great Britain in 1919, 1936, 1946, and in 1954 when the British troops evacuated Egypt.
With incidents of conflict between the Copts and the Muslims multiplying in Egypt, the call of the new Pope for national unity acquires added significance. After all, his great predecessor, Pope Shenouda III, was described as "Egypt's safety valve." In the same vein, Pope Theodoros sees in Egypt's Coptic heritage an avenue for preserving, through his medicine of love, a great antidote to Egypt's inter-religious anxieties.
"The Egyptian Coptic Church, "the new Pope declared," is a model for all churches, and for the Egyptian Community, in regard to the separation between State and Church."
The date of his elevation to the Papacy was November 4, 2012, his 60th birthday. His Egypt has changed since the revolution of January 25, 2011. A historic change has come to his land, the land of the Copts (Egypt), and so his message is a mixture of love, the creed of that Church which boasts of having the hiding place of the Holy family in Old Cairo, and unity, which has become quite elusive in this age of rage.
Theodoros II has a 1975 baccalaureate in pharmacy from the University of Alexandria. This was followed, ten years later, by a World Health Fellowship from the UK. For His Holiness, it was an 1985 double graduation. In that year, he was also able to graduate from the Coptic Clerical College in Egypt. After a period of seclusion as a monk at the Anba Bishoy Convent in Wadi Al-Natroun in 1986 in the western desert, he was ordained a Coptic priest in 1989. Within 8 years thereafter, he became a Bishop.
This new spiritual leader, whose original name was Wagih Sobhi Baqi Soliman, had a father who was a land surveyor. The family kept on moving in Egypt from east (Mansourah), to south (Souhag), to west (Damanhour). It was as if fate was offering the future Pope a broad look at his beloved Egypt.
On this Pope's shoulders lie the new burdens of remelding the Coptic community into one community with their Muslim brethren. It is not by numbers or a ratio of one Copt to 10 Muslims, forming the demography of 90 millions, the largest Arab State. It is by the shared history which began in the 8th Century since the time of Amre lbn Elass led the Muslims westward from Palestine into the Nile Valley. The new arrivals were under strict instructions from Khaliph Omar who, from Medina in what is now Saudi Arabia, ordered them in no uncertain terms: "No forced conversion. And learn from your brothers, the Copts."
This eventuated into Egypt becoming a model for the Islamic Law persistent call for diversity and respect for the other. But the ill wind of extremism, which cloaked itself in an Islamic garb, began as of the Khomeni revolution in Iran to blow westward blanketing Egypt in its path. Those ominous developments ignored the great patriotic stance of the Coptic church in regard to Egypt's gradual liberation from Great Britain in 1919, 1936, 1946, and in 1954 when the British troops evacuated Egypt.
With incidents of conflict between the Copts and the Muslims multiplying in Egypt, the call of the new Pope for national unity acquires added significance. After all, his great predecessor, Pope Shenouda III, was described as "Egypt's safety valve." In the same vein, Pope Theodoros sees in Egypt's Coptic heritage an avenue for preserving, through his medicine of love, a great antidote to Egypt's inter-religious anxieties.
"The Egyptian Coptic Church, "the new Pope declared," is a model for all churches, and for the Egyptian Community, in regard to the separation between State and Church."
Friday, November 9, 2012
Obama's Four More Years: The New Egypt Reacts
They proudly call him "the black American President." They devote to his success miles and miles of print. They attend in droves the celebrations held at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo. They openly show great relief for Romney's exist. Why?
Interest in America and its ways has never been more palpable. This phenomenon is fully shared by both the Islamists and the secularists. It is an interest which reflects general hope in a reinvigorated American involvement in the New Egypt, economically, educationally, technologically and in selected areas of foreign policy, especially in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. "Hope and Change," borrowed from Obama, has become an Egyptian mantra. Egyptian resentment toward America's support for Mubarak has practically dissipated.
Cairo's attitude toward Russia has sunk to a new low. The New Egypt feels abhorrence toward Moscow's support for the Assad regime in Syria. In this regard, Egypt, historically, has always looked west, not east. Contemporary Egypt was first developed by the French as of the early 19th century.
Egypt, taking a brief holiday from the woes of its transition from dictatorship to democracy, celebrated the onset of Obama's second term in adulatory terms. They highlighted Obama's call for healing the wounds of the bitter presidential campaign. "Tahrir" wishes that a similar reconciliation would be possible with the remnants of the Mubarak regime.
Cairo saw humility in Obama's declaration in his victory speech in Chicago that he had become "a better President." It wishes that its leaders would show the same strength of character. Though the challenges facing Washington, D.C. and Cairo may not be the same, but the Egyptians perceive in Obama's reference to "the challenges ahead" a reflection of what their new leaders keep on repeating.
Even Romney's speech conceding defeat and wishing Obama's success in the coming four years was a reminder to Egypt that it does not yet posses this tradition of congratulating your adversary.
There is also in Cairo that sense of quick pride in the enhanced importance of the minorities in America. The Egyptians also saw in the small margin of victory for Obama a reflection of what happened in the competition between Morsi and Shafik in June for the post of the presidency.
As to the expected "gridlock" in U.S. governance, well, that is nothing new to Cairo. This is although the Egyptian gridlock has different poles. In Cairo, it is between the judiciary and the other branches of government.
What did the New Egypt fear in Romney? First, they do not know Romney. Romney did not even define himself. Romney was defined by his adversaries. Second, they were hostile to his references to the rise of the Islamists to power as "chaos in the Middle East." The Egyptians also saw in Romney a man of war. In Obama, they saw a man of peace, especially as regards Iran.
It also greatly helps that Obama's middle name is "Hussein."
Interest in America and its ways has never been more palpable. This phenomenon is fully shared by both the Islamists and the secularists. It is an interest which reflects general hope in a reinvigorated American involvement in the New Egypt, economically, educationally, technologically and in selected areas of foreign policy, especially in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. "Hope and Change," borrowed from Obama, has become an Egyptian mantra. Egyptian resentment toward America's support for Mubarak has practically dissipated.
Cairo's attitude toward Russia has sunk to a new low. The New Egypt feels abhorrence toward Moscow's support for the Assad regime in Syria. In this regard, Egypt, historically, has always looked west, not east. Contemporary Egypt was first developed by the French as of the early 19th century.
Egypt, taking a brief holiday from the woes of its transition from dictatorship to democracy, celebrated the onset of Obama's second term in adulatory terms. They highlighted Obama's call for healing the wounds of the bitter presidential campaign. "Tahrir" wishes that a similar reconciliation would be possible with the remnants of the Mubarak regime.
Cairo saw humility in Obama's declaration in his victory speech in Chicago that he had become "a better President." It wishes that its leaders would show the same strength of character. Though the challenges facing Washington, D.C. and Cairo may not be the same, but the Egyptians perceive in Obama's reference to "the challenges ahead" a reflection of what their new leaders keep on repeating.
Even Romney's speech conceding defeat and wishing Obama's success in the coming four years was a reminder to Egypt that it does not yet posses this tradition of congratulating your adversary.
There is also in Cairo that sense of quick pride in the enhanced importance of the minorities in America. The Egyptians also saw in the small margin of victory for Obama a reflection of what happened in the competition between Morsi and Shafik in June for the post of the presidency.
As to the expected "gridlock" in U.S. governance, well, that is nothing new to Cairo. This is although the Egyptian gridlock has different poles. In Cairo, it is between the judiciary and the other branches of government.
What did the New Egypt fear in Romney? First, they do not know Romney. Romney did not even define himself. Romney was defined by his adversaries. Second, they were hostile to his references to the rise of the Islamists to power as "chaos in the Middle East." The Egyptians also saw in Romney a man of war. In Obama, they saw a man of peace, especially as regards Iran.
It also greatly helps that Obama's middle name is "Hussein."
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