Fahmi Omar, former head of Egyptian Broadcasting, broke the news of the army coup d'état on the morning of 23 July 1952 to an anxious Egyptian public. In an interview with Omayma Abdel-Latif, he gives a rare glimpse of how the Free Officers first made their movement public Click to view caption "This is Cairo. The clock of Fouad University has just struck 7:30am. Here is the news." With these words, Fahmi Omar, then a presenter at Egyptian Broadcasting and later head of the network, first broke the news of the momentous events that had taken place overnight in Egypt to his listeners on the morning of 23 July 1952. Those at the receiving end, however, still would not have had any idea of the news that Omar was about to break, nor could they have known that this news was going to change the face of Egypt forever. At that time, Omar remembers, news was a precious commodity, the country having been in political turmoil for months, and people would tune in anxiously each day to hear the latest developments. "We had had three cabinets in three days at that time," Omar says, "and there was a real desire among people to make sense of the chaos that seemed to be engulfing the country." The now 74-year-old Omar has an impressive memory of those says half a century ago. He vividly remembers the minutest details of the day the army took over the country and of how the leaders of the coup then went public with the news. Omar had joined Egyptian Broadcasting, then owned by Marconi, an English company, two years earlier in May 1950, and when the revolution broke he was in charge of the morning shift at the radio. "I arrived for work at the radio studios in Elwi Street in Cairo at around 6:10 in the morning, because at the time transmission began at 6:30," Omar remembers. I immediately noticed that there were armoured cars surrounding the broadcasting building, and when I went in I was approached by an officer who, when he realised who I was, accompanied me to the main studio where I found Anwar El-Sadat sitting next to some other officers. Sadat came up to me and said, 'we have some statements we want to air today when you begin the broadcast.'" His initial response to Sadat's request was to welcome it, assuring Sadat that time would be found in that morning's broadcast to air the army's statement� Omar says that he did not consult with his superiors first before making the decision. "First, I did not think that I would have the luxury of consulting them, especially when I did not even know their phone numbers, and anyway there were dozens of officers in the Radio building. I sensed that something serious was taking place, and, since I too was someone involved in resisting the British occupation, I thought perhaps that these statements might usher in the changes that everyone then was anxiously waiting for." In this respect, however, Omar's recollections contradict those of others, such as of Hosni El-Haddidi, a senior broadcaster of the time, who wrote in his later memoirs that he had telephoned Omar on the morning of the coup, warning him not to object to any of the Officers' demands. Similarly, Ali Khalil, then managing director of Egyptian Broadcasting, refers in his memoirs to a telephone conversation he had with Omar on the morning of 23 July 1952, telling him to be cautious about how he reacted to the Officers' demands, since if he followed them "the king will eliminate you". Omar declined to comment on these two other conflicting versions of events. Omar remembers that the vast majority of the nation's radio listeners would have been able to hear the first statement aired by the Free Officers on the 7:30 news. The broadcast had been delayed by one hour, from 6:30 till 7:30, due to technical problems, and the transmission was interrupted twice before the army took control of the Radio's main transmission station at Abu Zaabal. "Sadat was sitting next to me in the studio, fully prepared to air the statement shortly after I began my shift at 6:30," Omar recalls. "But when I told him that the transmission has been interrupted, his face turned white as a sheet, and he became nervous and agitated. I think that during this time there was a struggle going on between the forces of Cairo governor Murtada El-Queeshi, who had given instructions that power be cut off to the Abu Zaabal transmission station, and the Free Officers. Later, the army managed to take control of the station, allowing the transmission to continue. I began the news by saying, 'we have a statement from the General Command of the Armed Forces.'" "I asked Sadat whether he wanted me to mention him by name, but he declined, making the statement in good Arabic and then leaving the building immediately afterwards." Ironically, the next item on the news that day, Omar remembers, "was about King Farouk receiving the newly appointed prime minister to discuss the formation of a new cabinet." "The recording of the statement of the revolution in the archive of Egyptian Broadcasting is by Anwar El-Sadat, made in January 1953 when Radio Cairo was celebrating the first six months of the revolution. Initially, however, the statement was actually first recorded by an anonymous officer, whose Arabic, Omar says, was "shameful". In the evening of 23 July, the statement was re-recorded by a famous radio presenter of the time, Galal Mawaad" This incident reflects the sense of confusion that would have reigned that morning at Egyptian Broadcasting, and in the country at large, about the political implications of the day's events and the army's move. The situation remained unclear for at least the revolution's first day, the Officers in their attempts at consolidating their newly won power returning to the Radio building throughout the day to repeat their statement. The recording of the statement of the revolution in the archive of Egyptian Broadcasting is by Anwar El-Sadat, made in January 1953 when Radio Cairo was celebrating the first six months of the revolution. Initially, however, the statement was actually first recorded by an anonymous officer, whose Arabic, Omar says, was "shameful." In the evening of 23 July, the statement was re-recorded by a famous radio presenter of the time, Galal Mawaad. "The Officers wanted the news to reach everybody, and to let people know that they had successfully taken control of the broadcasting building and therefore of the only medium that could put them in touch with millions of people throughout the nation," Omar said. The reliance the Free Officers placed on the radio for disseminating news of the revolution was also due to the fact that in 1952, when illiteracy rates had reached tragic proportions due to the high cost of education, newspapers such as Al-Ahram and Al-Akhbar were read only by the country's educated elite, and only radio could reach the vast majority of the country's population, in whose name the revolution had been made. This helps explain why the Officers "camped" in the Broadcasting building for a full 40 days after 23 July. "They wanted to ensure that the medium was under their full control," Omar remembers, adding that in any case the broadcasting staff at the time, consisting of seven men and three women, were sympathetic to the movement. "One has to look at this from an historical perspective," he says. "Everyone at that time was waiting for change to happen, and we, firstly as Egyptians and secondly as broadcasters, allied ourselves with the movement because at the beginning we believed in it." This belief resulted in Egyptian Broadcasting being turned almost into the mouthpiece of the new regime, even before it was nationalised and came under the direct control of the State. Coverage of events related to the revolution was extensive. The Radio's new role was being shaped during the early days of the revolution, and introducing the young Free Officers who had just assumed control of the country to the public and propagating their ideas was the number one task of the time. Indeed, the role carved out for radio within Egyptian public life in those first post-revolutionary years has remained little changed until today. "We served the revolution very well," Omar recalls. "We covered all the events, conferences, speeches and what have you, and the news bulletins were always all about the activities of the Free Officers, particularly Mohamed Naguib." "In addition, we propagated the revolution in other, less formal ways, broadcasting songs to stir up patriotic sentiments, programmes to explain the Officers' new thinking and so on. In a nutshell, Egyptian Broadcasting at that time reflected the state of euphoria which had engulfed the whole country, extensively covering both the events of the revolution and their aftermath." Asked whether the extensive radio coverage given the Free Officers' movement at this time also tried to reflect the discontent at the coup d'état felt elsewhere in the country, particularly among the different political forces, Omar admits that the radio definitely gave one-sided coverage. The radio was not critical of the Free Officers, and it did not attempt to criticise their still vague political orientation. "At that time, no one dared criticise the movement or the Officers," he remembers. "The newspapers, which still had some editorial independence, did not dare to do so, and when the editor of Al-Masri wrote an editorial in his newspaper urging the Officers to go back to their barracks, the paper was closed down." Despite these ominous signs, Omar, however, still defends the revolution, explaining that "I don't think it is fair to judge the revolution by today's standards. It was, I believe, still a budding movement for a time after 23 July, and the Officers did everything they could to propagate it and protect it. In order to do so, it was only natural that they should have taken over the one medium that they thought could help them to do so, the radio." In his view, the revolution had both negative and positive aspects, and many revolutionary promises did not materialise. "One has to admit that the long-sought-after democratic rule that we hoped the Officers would introduce did not materialise, and it was particularly absent at the beginning of the revolution. There is also the legacy we have inherited from those days of the state-owned media. Although we now have privately owned television channels, the radio is still state-owned. I believe that radio in Egypt has shaped, and been shaped by, the revolution. The role of the radio in a society like Egypt was defined during the early years of the revolution, and its impact is still felt today." While there is a consensus among historians that the radio played the most important role in reinforcing the new movement, being the medium through which the vast majority of the population first heard about the revolution and later came to understand it, it was the country's print media that made the first efforts at criticising and analysing the 23 July coup d'état and subsequent events. On 24 July 1952, Al-Ahram's front page headlines read, "the Army conducts a peaceful military move, arresting several senior officers and protecting pubic services. General Mohamed Naguib is to head the General Command of the Armed Forces, and he states that the Army is working in the interests of the country and within the framework of the Constitution". On the same front page, Ahmed El-Sawi Mohamed, then editor-in-chief of Al-Ahram, described the army movement as "limited", saying that it had been initiated to carry out reform and reinforce democratic rule. Once these objectives had been achieved, the army would return to its barracks and civilian rule would be restored, he wrote. Al-Ahram also reported the army's aims, among the most important of which would be the "restoration of the Constitution and purging the country of corruption". On 27 July, Al-Ahram reported the abdication of King Farouk on its front page, in favour of the Crown Prince, Prince Ahmed Fouad. The issue also carried a photograph of the man then believed to have been the leader of the military coup, Mohamed Naguib, which was the first ever published of the head of the military movement. The same issue of the newspaper contained a series of important revolutionary documents, including Naguib's statement declaring himself to be leader of the coup and head of the army, a statement on the abdication of King Farouk and a further statement concerning interim constitutional arrangements, all carefully worded, the newspaper noted, to observe the country's constitution, still in force, to the letter.
