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Referendum just first step on a long road for Egypt

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egypt constitution referendumCairo, Egypt- A successful completion of the constitution referendum is only the first step on a long road for Egypt – political, economic, security and foreign policy challenges remain.

Security will be heightened over the coming days ahead of the constitution referendum on 14-15 January.

The army and police have three objectives: protect polling stations and voters from possible violence by Islamist militants, secure civil servants and judges supervising the vote, prevent anti-constitution demonstrations by the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies.

Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim has repeatedly vowed to block alleged plans by the Brotherhood to derail the referendum.

A Yes vote – which Amr Moussa, head of the constitution-drafting panel, has predicted will be around 75 percent – would mark a significant milestone in the transition roadmap announced when president Mohamed Morsi was removed on 3 July. A significant number of challenges will remain, however.

Elections call

A prime challenge for the authorities is to decide whether to follow the referendum with parliamentary then presidential elections, or to reverse the order or even to conduct them simultaneously.

According to informed sources who spoke to Al-Ahram Weekly, the trend is leaning heavily towards holding presidential elections first in order to provide a stable leader to deal with Egypt’s daunting security and economic challenges.

Interim President Adly Mansour and Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, army chief and possible presidential contender, have long favoured sticking to the roadmap in order to avoid allegations of manipulating the plan for their own benefit, one informed source says.

“For his part, El-Sisi will prefer to see the composition of parliament before deciding whether to run for president because a largely supportive parliament would facilitate the daunting presidential task,” the source adds.

An El-Sisi candidacy would be controversial in itself because he led the removal of Morsi. It would also further enrage many Islamists and possibly provoke jealousy from other senior military men.

The army chief would likely win comfortably if he decides to stand, according to most independent analysts.

The election of El-Sisi as president would not immediately lead to increased stability unless it is coupled with a supportive parliament and cabinet, according to an analyst.

A lack of coordination between cabinet and presidency could mean a lack of serious political or socio-economic achievements and increased public anger – not to mention reignite the Islamist opposition, the analyst says.

The majority rule challenge

Hanaa Ebeid, a political psychologist, is concerned that if one camp gains full control it will clampdown on any opposition. “I am worried in general about a state of mind where the majority is so satisfied with being in power that it shows aversion to the opposition; this is precisely what the Muslim Brotherhood did when they were in power and this is precisely what I fear the next ruling group will do.”

According to Ebeid, this syndrome of deliberate exclusion prompts a subsequent syndrome: the destructive pursuit of revenge.

Economy, first and foremost

Even if the roadmap is successfully completed, there will still be a number of daunting tasks ahead for the new government – especially the economy.

Introducing unpopular reforms, attracting investment and tackling the acute budget deficit are obvious tasks for the next regime.

Economist Riham El-Dessouki suspects the restructuring of subsidies – the most unpopular economic decision to be expected – is unlikely to be introduced this year, given that presidential and parliamentary elections are unlikely to be concluded before July.

Reforms to energy subsidies, which consume around 70 percent of the subsidy budget, have been lined up since 2007 but have never been introduction for fear of provoking public anger – it is hard to see how these factors can be overlooked, El-Dessouki says.

The new government is unlikely to remove subsidies, especially on gas cylinders and gas oil which eat up the largest proportion of energy subsidies and which cater for society’s poorest. It is also unlikely that rises in fuel prices for energy-intensive industries will be introduced, in order to avoid upsetting the business community and because fuel prices for these industries have already been made.

Fixing inflation and the budget deficit will remain a challenge, despite generous Gulf financial aid, before a hoped for increase in economic growth in two to three years, say government sources.

Economic growth is a serious possibility once stability is secured and sufficient legal assurances are granted, argues El-Dessouki.

“What counts most for me is to have things pick up, to have tourists come back and to have a better income so I can pay off my debts and provide for my family,” says Ali, a taxi driver in his mid-fifties. “If the economy does not pick up then nothing matters at all,” he adds.

Foreign policy hazards

While government officials agree the economy is the most pressing challenge, they agree without hesitation that foreign policy is a similar challenge.

“It goes way beyond bypassing apprehension over the chances of democracy or the attempt to stir unrest through financing angry opposition groups or even terror groups,” suggests a senior Egyptian diplomat.

Egypt has three pressing foreign policy issues that must be attended to without delay, he says.

First, is to find a settlement with Ethiopia over the Renaissance Dam, which could cause considerable water shortages in Egypt. Egypt had counted on international pressure on Addis Ababa but in view of Egypt’s declining international standing and its internal problems, this pressure has been reduced to a minimum, he adds.

Egypt also has to restore its much weakened status in the Middle East, he adds. Again, this is difficult due to its domestic difficulties and “of course the sharp economic decline that makes us dependent on economic aid and consequently limits our scope for taking the initiative.”

“Take Syria, for example. Our hands are tied in terms of proposing initiatives there because we need to fully synchronise our positions with the Saudis who have been very supportive of us since 30 June,” he says.

A third task is to break away from a quasi-international isolation that Egypt has been facing. “The [foreign] minister has been touring the world but one cannot miss the very limited volume of foreign visits to Cairo since the ouster of Morsi,” he says.

“We hope once an elected president is in office things will change but it would be wrong to underestimate the reaction to an El-Sisi presidency – but we already hard at work explaining to the world that it is the true wish of the majority of the people that El-Sisi runs for president.”

Ahram

Photo: An Egyptian pretzel vender sits next to copies of the new constitution sold on a street in Cairo, Egypt (Photo: AP)

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2 responses to “Referendum just first step on a long road for Egypt”

  1. Btru2u Avatar
    Btru2u

    Indeed, how could these so-called pro-democracy groups call themselves “democrats” when they defiantly reject the will of the people which brought Mursi to power in Egypt? How could they call themselves “democrats” and at the same time refuse to allow the people to vote in a referendum over a draft constitution?
    I saw huge crowds, mobilized by the opposition, screaming rabidly outside the presidential palace shouting obscenities at the president, even calling for his murder. In fact, some of the more rabid and convulsive representatives of the opposition had the shamelessness to call Mursi “Nazi, thug, traitor and Mursilini” (a play on the name of the Italian fascist dictator Mussolini).
    This is more than committing an act of lewdness with truth, honesty and even language. How could any honest person under the sun call a democratically-elected president, who only came to power a few moths ago, “Nazi and Hitler?” Hitler, for those ignoramuses who don’t know history, destroyed Europe, and killed or caused the death of more than 50 million people. The Hitler’s regime committed indescribably nefarious war crimes against humanity. Therefore, throwing such epithets at the President, just because he hailed from an Islamist party, is really beyond the pale of simple human decency.
    It is really sad that instead of engaging the President in a constructive dialogue, the Egyptian opposition is indulging in a puerile spasmodic discourse, infinitely corrupt analogies and name-calling, which really reflect the primitive political culture and malicious intent of this opposition. Yes, President Mursi, like all mortals, is not infallible. But he is a democratically elected leader of the country. This means that the losing political parties have no right to mobilize its rabbles to close in on Presidential palaces, hurl Molotov cocktails and even open fire on the president’s supporters. killing eight of them.
    I am not saying that everyone that demonstrated or is demonstrating against Mursi is guilty. However, the opposition parties should have made sure that “fifth columnists” didn’t infiltrate their ranks. In addition, democracy is about empowering the people to choose their leaders and decide the way they are ruled. It is about enabling the masses to determine the nature of their constitution. It is about the separation of powers. And above all, it is about law and order.
    Hence, vulgarity, vandalism, terrorism and sowing anarchy and chaos have nothing to do with democracy. The same thing applies to attacking and torching public and private buildings as well as the offices of other political parties. I dare accuse the opposition to Mursi of political adolescence, ill-will, incivility and excessive narcissism. They are politically adolescent because they are yet to bring themselves to accepting the rules of the democratic game, namely that the people, not the rabble, have the right to decide. They are uncivilized because it is a sign of disgraceful incivility to express political opposition to government by torching building and spreading chaos, let alone calling for the ousting of a president who was only elected a few months ago. And as to calling the president “Nazi, thug, and Hitler,” this is actually tantamount to inciting to murderer because words can kill. Moreover, the opposition has malicious intents because it has become amply clear that its real aims exceed by far the mere realization of a consensus over the draft constitution.
    Their real aim is to overthrow the president by way of spreading turbulence and chaos which would force the people to call on the military to carry out a coup. Of course, they don’t have the moral courage to reveal their real intents, but their actions and behaviors, especially their rejection of all the calls for dialogue by the President and their dark embrace of Mubarak’s thugs and Baltagiya, expose their political and moral bankruptcy.
    President Mursi has argued rather correctly that when there are sharp political divisions within any country, the ultimate solution lies in the ballot boxes. Unfortunately, the opposition, including pseudo-democrats who lived in the west for several decades, is not willing to accept this simple axiomatic logic. Instead, they want the president to budge to the vociferous raving and ranting of a small minority of their supporters who insist on ignoring the millions of other Egyptians who have given him their votes.
    There is another important point which the opposition and the anti-Mursi media keep ignoring. It is the malicious intention of Mubarak’s constitutional court to dissolve the Upper Chamber of Parliament, the constitutional assembly, leading up to declaring the presidential elections null and void. It is this looming conspiracy that forced the President to speed up the voting on the draft constitution lest these Mubarak judges once again rape the will of the Egyptian people and decapitate the revolution by way of deception and judicial chicanery.
    This is not a mere speculation. The very same court previously unlawfully and illegitimately annulled the democratically elected parliament for frivolous and vapid reasons in order to rob the Islamists of the resounding victory they had scored in the parliamentary elections. Indeed, one of the judges, Tahani Jabali, who is also a self-described hater of the Muslim Brotherhood, told the New York Times that the Constitutional Court had to annul the elections for political not legal or judicial reasons, namely to prevent the Islamists from controlling parliament and taking over the country. Jabali denied the report, but the New York Times journalist who interviewed her challenged her to prove him wrong.

  2. Btru2u Avatar
    Btru2u

    Indeed, how could these so-called pro-democracy groups call themselves “democrats” when they defiantly reject the will of the people which brought Mursi to power in Egypt? How could they call themselves “democrats” and at the same time refuse to allow the people to vote in a referendum over a draft constitution?
    I saw huge crowds, mobilized by the opposition, screaming rabidly outside the presidential palace shouting obscenities at the president, even calling for his murder. In fact, some of the more rabid and convulsive representatives of the opposition had the shamelessness to call Mursi “Nazi, thug, traitor and Mursilini” (a play on the name of the Italian fascist dictator Mussolini).
    This is more than committing an act of lewdness with truth, honesty and even language. How could any honest person under the sun call a democratically-elected president, who only came to power a few moths ago, “Nazi and Hitler?” Hitler, for those ignoramuses who don’t know history, destroyed Europe, and killed or caused the death of more than 50 million people. The Hitler’s regime committed indescribably nefarious war crimes against humanity. Therefore, throwing such epithets at the President, just because he hailed from an Islamist party, is really beyond the pale of simple human decency.
    It is really sad that instead of engaging the President in a constructive dialogue, the Egyptian opposition is indulging in a puerile spasmodic discourse, infinitely corrupt analogies and name-calling, which really reflect the primitive political culture and malicious intent of this opposition. Yes, President Mursi, like all mortals, is not infallible. But he is a democratically elected leader of the country. This means that the losing political parties have no right to mobilize its rabbles to close in on Presidential palaces, hurl Molotov cocktails and even open fire on the president’s supporters. killing eight of them.
    I am not saying that everyone that demonstrated or is demonstrating against Mursi is guilty. However, the opposition parties should have made sure that “fifth columnists” didn’t infiltrate their ranks. In addition, democracy is about empowering the people to choose their leaders and decide the way they are ruled. It is about enabling the masses to determine the nature of their constitution. It is about the separation of powers. And above all, it is about law and order.
    Hence, vulgarity, vandalism, terrorism and sowing anarchy and chaos have nothing to do with democracy. The same thing applies to attacking and torching public and private buildings as well as the offices of other political parties. I dare accuse the opposition to Mursi of political adolescence, ill-will, incivility and excessive narcissism. They are politically adolescent because they are yet to bring themselves to accepting the rules of the democratic game, namely that the people, not the rabble, have the right to decide. They are uncivilized because it is a sign of disgraceful incivility to express political opposition to government by torching building and spreading chaos, let alone calling for the ousting of a president who was only elected a few months ago. And as to calling the president “Nazi, thug, and Hitler,” this is actually tantamount to inciting to murderer because words can kill. Moreover, the opposition has malicious intents because it has become amply clear that its real aims exceed by far the mere realization of a consensus over the draft constitution.
    Their real aim is to overthrow the president by way of spreading turbulence and chaos which would force the people to call on the military to carry out a coup. Of course, they don’t have the moral courage to reveal their real intents, but their actions and behaviors, especially their rejection of all the calls for dialogue by the President and their dark embrace of Mubarak’s thugs and Baltagiya, expose their political and moral bankruptcy.
    President Mursi has argued rather correctly that when there are sharp political divisions within any country, the ultimate solution lies in the ballot boxes. Unfortunately, the opposition, including pseudo-democrats who lived in the west for several decades, is not willing to accept this simple axiomatic logic. Instead, they want the president to budge to the vociferous raving and ranting of a small minority of their supporters who insist on ignoring the millions of other Egyptians who have given him their votes.
    There is another important point which the opposition and the anti-Mursi media keep ignoring. It is the malicious intention of Mubarak’s constitutional court to dissolve the Upper Chamber of Parliament, the constitutional assembly, leading up to declaring the presidential elections null and void. It is this looming conspiracy that forced the President to speed up the voting on the draft constitution lest these Mubarak judges once again rape the will of the Egyptian people and decapitate the revolution by way of deception and judicial chicanery.
    This is not a mere speculation. The very same court previously unlawfully and illegitimately annulled the democratically elected parliament for frivolous and vapid reasons in order to rob the Islamists of the resounding victory they had scored in the parliamentary elections. Indeed, one of the judges, Tahani Jabali, who is also a self-described hater of the Muslim Brotherhood, told the New York Times that the Constitutional Court had to annul the elections for political not legal or judicial reasons, namely to prevent the Islamists from controlling parliament and taking over the country. Jabali denied the report, but the New York Times journalist who interviewed her challenged her to prove him wrong.

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