The public is disappointed with Egypt's post-revolutionary leadership. Do you see the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) as culprit or victim? Let me make it clear that what we are talking about here is not the MB but a faction — Al-Tanzim Al-Sirri (the Secret Outfit) — that has been causing trouble for a long time. It is the Secret Outfit, not the MB, which is responsible for much of the harm done to Egypt since the revolution. Mohamed Morsi won five million votes or so in the first round, thanks to the efforts of the MB and its supporters. In the runoffs he wasn't expected to win much more but the national opposition backed him up on certain conditions — that power would be shared, that the constitution would be consensual, and that the demands of the revolution would be met. The opposition put together enough votes for Morsi to beat Ahmed Shafik. So it was with God's will and the help of the opposition that Morsi won. He was supposed to treat the opposition better than he did. Instead, he slammed the opposition with the emergency law, murdered its sons in the streets and passed laws to restrict protests.
Aren't you going too far when you accuse him of murder? Morsi is politically responsible for what happened. In his speeches there is a subtext of inciting violence against the revolutionaries. He has never deigned to negotiate with the opposition or take it seriously. The opposition has been shocked by Morsi's conduct. They feel stabbed in the back.
Doesn't the opposition — especially the National Salvation Front — bear part of the blame for spurning dialogue with Morsi? No one is wholly innocent. But blame must be allocated in proportion to power. Those most to blame for the infighting, the fragmentation and the instability are the president and his Secret Outfit. We all know presidential advisors from outside the Secret Outfit were window dressing. It is essential that MB supporters and the wider public realise that a MB geared towards preaching ended the moment the Secret Outfit took control of the organisation in 1996. It all started with a demagogic (sic) oath of loyalty. Remaining MB functionaries are of an inferior type. They are the dregs of the Secret Outfit. I have historical and organisational evidence to back my words. A plot was hatched to remove decent MB members interested in preaching and public service and replace them with people who care for little apart from money, power and revenge. This is what the ideology of the Secret Outfit boils down to.
You keep calling them the Secret Outfit though we know every one of them by name. Why is that? Secrecy is a state of mind as well as a method of operation. Secrecy is not just about concealing weapons and such. The MB is secretive about everything. No one knows the number of members. It is secretive about funding. No one knows where the money comes from and what it is spent on. The entire MB was hijacked by the Secret Outfit. There has been a steady stream of unethical actions, the forging of elections on all levels, the character assassination of respectable leaders in an attempt to discredit them with MB supporters. These methods ensured the disappearance of committed MB figures and their replacement with men from the Secret Outfit.
Before the revolution the MB had a decent reputation. What happened? The high regard was due to respectable figures such as Omar Al-Tilmisani, Abdel-Aziz Kamel, Abdel-Muiz Abdel-Sattar, Mohamed Abul-Nasr, Salah Shadi and Ibrahim Salah. The Secret Outfit was kept on a tight leash, both by the wider MB and people who knew about its bloody past. Earlier regimes used the unsavoury past of secret outfits to defame the entire MB. They even helped them along. The regime knew, through underground contacts and through State Security intelligence, that the Secret Outfit couldn't do anything to undermine the ruler. Kifaya [movement] was leading the opposition, clearly denouncing the extension [of Mubarak's rule] and attempts to bequest [power to Mubarak's son].
What concerns you most about the MB? I like a lot of MB members and a lot of them like me. I cherish the good rapport I have with reputable MB leaders who engage in preaching and public service. But I am an enemy — a sworn enemy — of the Secret Outfit and its detestable ways.
How many of them are there? About 50,000. The Secret Outfit runs all the administrative bodies referred to as the MB.
What do you think were the MB's biggest mistakes following the January Revolution? The first mistake was to poison relations with the opposition and refuse to recognise its role in bringing Morsi to power. The second was to then accuse the opposition of treason and of acting as agents for outsiders. The third mistake was the conflict between the presidency and the judiciary. The rulings of the Constitutional Court were viewed with utter resentment by MB leaders. This goes for the court ruling calling for amendments to the election law. MB leaders are very uncomfortable with the Constitutional Court, although the latter should be seen as a guarantor of legal stability. The court is not a partisan to conflict. It was formed according to the constitution they (the MB) wrote. In its current it doesn't include any individuals who can possibly be considered enemies of the MB. A fourth, terrible error, is their position on the Palestinian issue. Egypt has become little more than a feeble mediator between the Palestinian people and the Israeli occupiers. Often Egypt intervenes to tone down Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupiers. Naturally, this is disgraceful to anyone who claims to be Islamist, patriot, or just Egyptian. Our relations with the Zionist occupiers are borne out of war and blood. At one point Egypt couldn't afford to keep up the military confrontation and signed a peace treaty on unfair terms. It is Egypt's duty to support any type of resistance in the occupied land, not to act as a disinterested observer or mediator. It should support and encourage the resistance and even create it if it can. None of this is true under this government, which claims to be Islamist and which pretends — falsely — to represent the MB. The situation is getting worse because Egypt hasn't befriended anyone — inside or outside the region — except America's friends. Egypt is now a hostage to American policy. Egypt is left with only two friends — Qatar and Turkey. Turkey is a member of NATO and its policies are designed to suit US and European purposes. This is its role. Qatar is semi-occupied by the American military. Both Turkey and Qatar take their political cue from the US. So our decisions in all political matters in the region are inseparable from America's wishes. We have no independent policy. I see nothing Islamic in that. After the revolution, when Morsi came to power, the government was supposed to pay attention to religious institutions in Egypt; namely, Al-Azhar and Al-Awqaf (Ministry of Religious Endowments). Instead, [MB officials] started talking about loans, about selling the Suez Canal to Qatar, about the World Bank. You don't hear anything about scientific research or technology — the two main engines of development. All these are mistakes: the MB's attitude towards the opposition and the judiciary and its rapport with the outside world. As for the demands that people revolted to achieve, no progress has been made. Social justice means equality among people in general. Yet those who rule now in the name of religion are helping only their friends and denying everything to their opponents.
Has the MB been given a real chance to rule? No one asked for the moon. The people only expected promises to be kept, power to be shared. They did not expect rulers hell bent on bringing the country down. There is a saying that goes so, “You need clouds to get rain”. [The MB] had it chance and then some. But its style of leadership was a flop. The atmosphere after the revolution was perfect for anyone with good intentions. The mood was patriotic. The public was prepared to go great lengths with any successor of Mubarak. But the miserable individuals who came to power dashed our dreams and took us into a dark tunnel. Then they turned to outsiders for help against domestic opponents. Then the killing started, and the perpetrators were never found out. They turned happiness into misery. This is why Egypt rose against them: to regain its hijacked revolution.
There is a question of legality. How can the MB legalise its operations? This is a revealing question. It illustrates the psychological limitations of the Secret Outfit. Its leaders don't do accountability, not even when they are in power. They abhor the notion of foresight. They want to push everyone around, without any legal impediments. The Secret Outfit has an ingrained problem with the judiciary and with the law. A lot of blood has run since the killing of Judge [Ahmed] Al-Khazindar [in 1948] and today. They have trouble with the very idea of a civil state. In their heart of their hearts they believe that they are better off without a civil state, better off even without a president. They prefer to function within a fragile state. A state that respects institutions, that plans ahead, is a state that current MB leaders cannot deal with.
How committed do you think the MB is to consultation and democracy? The Secret Outfit, which is ruling the MB right now, has no use for democracy or consultation. It is a dictatorial outfit which forces its followers to obey decisions they often do not understand. Half of the MB community, women, are left out of decision-making. The other half is divided into various departments. It is a tiny group that makes decisions without consulting anyone. Of the 20 members of the Guidance Bureau five call the shots. They meet alone and then go to the Guidance Bureau to push their decisions through. These are the individuals who, for example, made a deal with [Mubarak's General Intelligence chief and vice president] Omar Suleiman behind the back of Tahrir's youth. The rest of the Guidance Bureau knew nothing about that deal. Often, it is one person or a tiny group of people who call the shots, who determine policy, and then pretend that the decisions were consensual. Decisions are manipulated under the cover of darkness. There is no struggle of wills, only imposition and orders, submission and implementation. Yet even so I see a power struggle in the making, mainly because the business people within the MB want to use political power to make as much money as possible. I expect massive partnerships to be announced, involving former National Democratic Party (NDP) members once the legal cases against them are settled. Certain members of the Secret Outfit are pushing hard for partnership with former NDP businessmen. This is big, and there will be ripples within the MB. There is also a scramble for top government positions. Everyone wants a post. One wants to be a governor. Another wants to be a head of a centre, or a parliamentarian, etc. Everyone is trying to get a cut of the cake, of the spoils of the former regime.
You're saying that the focus within the MB has shifted from proselytising to finance. Who's responsible for that? Khairat Al-Shater, with the help of the Secret Outfit. Other MB members don't want to raise a stink because they hope to get something out of it. I was in prison with Al-Shater for three years and we got along fine. But I didn't like it when he took the MB down a perilous road, turning it into a group that is concerned primarily with money and material benefits.
Some people say that the only solution is a military coup. What do you have to say about that? That would be jumping from the frying pan into the fire. My advice is to steer clear from any military solution. We need a political and patriotic solution. We must keep in mind that any army in the world is loyal to the country that arms it. In Egypt's case that is America. So should the army intervene it will be because America — not Egypt — wants it to do so.
What kind of solution do you suggest? The solution is for all the politicians who emerged on the scene after the revolution — both in the government and the opposition — to go back to square one, to the day the revolution succeeded, on 11 February 2011. They should form a constituent commission to supervise the transition. The constituent commission should be formed of reputable technocrats. It should comprise people who are not public figures but high achievers in their fields. These are the ones who keep the country running. The political parties and the illegal groups, they don't represent true Egypt in any way. Such a commission, formed of 1,000 technocrats or so, will be in a position to tend to our various problems. And it should be given two years to finish its work. The same commission may elect a five-member committee to assume the functions of the president. Within the same commission we should be able to find individuals competent enough to be ministers and run the government. Once this is done, the commission should tend to writing the constitution and organising further elections. Unless this is done, we will be caught up in endless wrangling.
What are the obstacles facing the Islamist project? The Islamist project is faced with many obstacles. The first has to do with the advocates of this project and those who pose as its guardians. Among those people I detect a serious lack of understanding of religion and its message, and I see complete ignorance of Islamic history, old and new. I know of Islamists who don't learn over time, who refuse to change their positions based on experience. Their views are simple and immutable. The biggest problem facing the Islamist project is with its self-appointed champions. The second obstacle has to do with the ignorance and illiteracy that is widespread among Islamic nations. The third obstacle is foreign interests. International powers have an interest in keeping the Islamic world weak so as to exploit its resources, rob it blind, and manipulate its culture with ease. Let's not forget the role of foreign schools and universities which spread Western culture that is alien to the spirit of Egyptian society. All of the above combine to turn our region into a mere market for foreign goods and a land that is easily pillaged. The fourth, and most important obstacle, is Israel, the primary cause of disturbance in the region. The Zionist occupiers have sensed that the Muslims don't understand their own faith, so they turned them against one another, producing a conflict among Islamic factions. The Sunni-Shia conflict and current events in Syria, the situation in Bahrain and the situation in Egypt, are cases in point. Sectarian strife is a foreign plot of which Israel is the primary catalyst.
What advice would you offer President Morsi? President Morsi may still have a slim chance to salvage his good name as a university professor and also to save the good name of all Muslims which is more important than him or his narrow circle. One feels hurt by the insults levelled upon Islamists. If they were to improve their political performance this may lift this heavy weight from the shoulders of religion. Morsi's options are clear. He must go back to keeping the promises he made to the opposition. He must engage in true power sharing. He must quit placing his associates in top government posts. His current actions are not to the country's benefit. These actions will increase the people's resentment of a regime that is posing as Islamist. The current situation is causing a rift between the people and religion, which is against everything that the MB was supposed to stand for. The MB's original mission was to bring people closer to religion and bring religion closer to people.
