Revolutionary Anarchy

Revolutionary Anarchy
March 25th 2011

Eventual situations, in the Arab world in general and in Egypt in particular, are in fact confusing and perplexing and I think they represent such an unpredictable arena for many erudite people and thinkers who seem to be so flummoxed and stupefied that they have preferred to be either optimistic, upbeat and sanguine but they have to wait and see or pessimistic, demoralized and disheartened so they have got stunned. Although mass media especially TV’s can give glib talk shows that randomly host one-current direction which pours in the religious mire; the thing that seems to curtail January 25th youths’ movement into just some constitutional amendments of some articles, they cannot deliver or produce any cogent analysis or insight of what is happening. And because these mass media work without any agenda as they cannot yet categorize the youths’ movement of January 25th under revolution or just an up-rise, they confuse the movement when the mass media have invited clergymen to comment on what is happening. With this large area of mass media given to the clergymen, the youths’ up-rise seems to have been stripped off its nature as a revolution and it has been reduced as a mere rebellious movement snatched by the religious groups. Regardless of its peacefulness and being halcyon or its rampage and convulsiveness, the word “revolution” has been indefinitely and indecisively used and most likely to express any up-rise against authority or power, without taking in consideration the radical change or turn towards advancement to achieve the utmost of liberty, freedom, justice, equality and the international values of human rights so that the country can merge with the advancement and progress in all aspects of citizens’ lives that distinguish the free developed countries; the thing which might be a natural revolutionary outcome that is characterized by continuity, constancy, persistency, sustainability and perpetuity in an environment where physical, violent and concrete conflict disappears to be replaced by peaceful, mental and intellectual argumentations and dialectics. And in the modern world of the 21st century we are expected to look forward to modernity by means of science and technology that create an oasis of man’s proportional and relative welfare on earth not by means of the godly, heavenly, unseen and unearthly static absolutes that fondle and cozen the emotions of simple people just to turn them into a herd led by politicians to serve political ambitions of the leaders by whom the folk is saddled with heavy loads, without leaders themselves touching these loads, just to rule over the nation and to have all the plunders and pillages. Their aim here is to put the herd in unanimity that judges any outsider as god’s enemy who must be stopped or killed. This is what the poll on the constitutional amendments has shown when a pure political process has been turned into a religious and sectarian conflict between those who agree and those who disagree on the amendments. Thus the mass media have played an important role in excluding youths’ representatives from appearing on TV to explain their expectations; on the other hand it paved the way to clergymen to fill the void of the revolutionary youths and this has given the impression that the January 25th events can never be considered a revolution or if it was a revolution it had been hijacked by the religious groups.

An ordinary observer of the events and the way Muslim Brotherhood has been behaving since the up-break of the youths’ up-rise on January 25th can understand well the tactics which the group uses to reach their aims. From the very beginning of the events and because the up-rise success was not guaranteed or certain, the group declared that it has nothing to do with the events; and moreover many Muslim clergymen condemned the events supporting their condemnation with verses from the Quran and sayings of Islam prophet. When the youths remained in Liberation Square and insisted on their demands, the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood tried to work in entente with other opposition parties to negotiate with the government concerning youths’ demands; and for unknown reasons the opposition parties withdrew from this entente hence from negotiations and the Muslim Brotherhood leaders remained unique on the stage and tried to play the role of a peace dove between the regime and the revolutionary youths. Yet, they received a slap on the face when a spokesman of the revolutionary youth declared that they did not charge anyone to speak on their behalf; so the Muslim Brotherhood leaders and delegates retreated one step behind to see what would happen. However, they began to declare that their youths were participating in the up-rise but as individuals not as representatives of the group. For the eighteen-day life of the up-rise no religious slogans were raised and the Coptic youth participated in the up-rise despite their clergymen’s advice not to share. In fact, the scene in the Liberation Square was one hundred percent patriotic, national and pure Egyptian.

When the ex-President Hosni Mubark stepped down charging the Military Highest Council to take over, and the youth achieved their first demand, the godfather of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sheikh Karadawi, appeared in the Liberation Square leading the Friday prayer and giving a victorious speech in the mid of congregations. Since then the Muslim Brotherhood leaders have been holding meetings with the Military Highest Council as if they were the only power on the stage and as if they were the revolution makers, the thing which has turned them into a formal public power on the scene, while youths’ practices in the Liberation Square were confined in some celebrities and cleaning work. But this did not last for a long time as the youths realized that their demands were not only to oust the president but also the whole government and the whole regime; the thing that made the Military Highest Council dissolve the People’s Assembly and the Counsel Assembly and form a new government headed by Dr. Essam Elshareef. Then the military council formed a committee with two of its five members were Muslim Brotherhood’s advocates.

Now that the mass media especially the Egyptian formal TV with all its channels, have given large areas to radicals, fundamentalists, fanatic clergymen and Muslim Brotherhood leaders to propagate their principles and aims which range from civil state with religious reference to a completely religious state. With the roles distributed among the extremists and the so-called moderates, the revolutionary youths have almost disappeared from the scene. The two extremes played their roles well and dressed up in the camouflage that suits each situation, to a degree that some of them declared they would not object if a Copt was nominated a candidate for the position of presidency, and however they are sure no Muslim would vote for him. During that time some sectarian clashes between Muslims and Copts took place as a result of Muslims burning down a church in the village of Sool, Atfeeh, Helwan and the army did not take firm actions to prevent the Muslim aggressions on Copts and moreover the army helped the Muslims to ravage the Copts’ possessions at Elmokatem region and to kill thirteen people. And what made the matters worse was that the Army delegated the most fanatic fundamentalists of Muslim chiefs to interfere to settle the problems. Above all the TV hosted a President Elsadat’s murderer who was presented as a hero to declare that Copts must be humiliated and must pay “jezia” (money paid by non-Muslims to Muslims for just letting them live in the country).

Coming to the poll on the constitutional amendments which are originally and lawfully a great violation of all the process of any revolutionary change, the scene in fact was scandalous in all measures and the process of the poll instead of being a pure political process, the Muslim clergymen and the Muslim Brotherhood with all their spectra turned it into a religious issue in their mosques and on their mass media just to test their influence on the scene when they spread their propaganda that “Yes” is for the victory of Islam and “No” is against Islam and for the infidels. Adding to this, the practices of Muslim Brotherhood members at the poll centers were all against the simplest rules of democracy and freedom of choice since they prevented the voters whom they merely doubted they would say “No”. And when the results were declared as more than 77% said “Yes”, Muslim clergymen celebrated the occasion as a victory for a Muslim invasion which they called the “invasion of boxes”.

With all this anarchy and Muslim Brotherhood taking over the scene and the absence or absenteeism of revolutionary youths’ voices and the absence or absenteeism of philosophers, thinkers, scholars, intellectuals and moreover the non-existence of some authorized neutral explanations of the constitutional articles, we can say that the stage now is completely prepared for one-pole player with no contest at all and the revolution process has been aborted to exchange one totalitarian regime for another in sense that Egypt goes from worse to worst. Unless the youths of January 25th rise up again to protect their revolution, led by philosophers, thinkers and liberals, the future seems unpromising. Although I am not optimistic, nor am I pessimistic, I cannot lose hope as history can never go backwards.

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