There are many ways to refer to Mohamed Abul-Ghar, but as a longtime advocate of rights and equality is perhaps the most accurate. He, however, is sure to remind others, with a little emphasis in his voice, that he is associated — he does not use the word leader — with a political party, the Egyptian Democratic Social Party (EDSP), founded in 2011 following the 25 January Revolution on socialist-liberal ideological lines. Prime Minister Hazem Al-Beblawi and Deputy Prime Minister Ziad Bahaaeddin are both members of the EDSP. Abul-Ghar's discourse is hence designed not to contradict the positions of his party, especially when it comes to two of the most controversial — the candidacy of the army chief, Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi, in the next presidential elections and, though Abul-Ghar steers clear of the word, “reconciliation” with the Muslim Brotherhood. Speaking to the Al-Ahram Weekly, Abul-Ghar said that there might be a discrepancy between where he would have been “standing had it been a strictly individual choice” and where he is obliged to stand “as a member of a party, because these are rules of democracy” regarding both matters. The EDSP has been firm as a party and despite the independent views of its members on the second issue there will be no calls for the re-integration of the Muslim Brotherhood into political life, at least not for now. “There are too many grievances, and there is too much anger in society at large about the way the Muslim Brotherhood handled things on the road to and during the presidential tenure,” interrupted with the massive demonstrations that climaxed on 30 June last year with calls to end the group's rule, for the Brotherhood to be re-integrated, he said. The anger in many, though not all quarters of the EDSP, Abul-Ghar argues, has been intense enough to block sympathy with any injustice that Muslim Brotherhood members might be facing after the ouster of former president Mohamed Morsi on 3 July last year. “There is serious Muslim Brotherhood phobia in society. Anyone who seriously wants to work on societal cohesion would not make a breakthrough if they chose to turn their backs on this very clear fact. The Muslim Brotherhood has managed to scare people off, especially women and Christians,” Abul-Ghar said. “The Muslim Brotherhood suffered much harsher coercion during the rule of former president Gamal Abdel-Nasser in the 1950s and 1960s, but this time round the group's loss is bigger because unlike during the Nassser days when they had public sympathy, unannounced though it may have been, this time round people have really turned against them,” Abul-Ghar said. He added that what goes for society at large also goes for the EDPS. As for the candidacy of Al-Sisi, which Abul-Ghar said the army chief would be pursuing “promptly once a few unfinished matters relating to the armed forces are taken care of”, the EDPS leader said that the party had yet to announce its position. “This will have to be decided through the higher committee and not at an individual level. I have not decided who I will vote for.” “I would have to see the list of candidates, which unlike the last time [in 2012] promises to be a short one, and I would have to see their programmes,” he said. “I know that some newspapers have suggested that I would vote for Al-Sisi, but what I said was that I would want to see a civil president, which could arguably be Al-Sisi once he resigns from the army. I know first-hand through my many encounters with people across the nation that once he nominates himself Al-Sisi is likely to be elected in a democratic election,” meaning that there will be a hands-off approach from the state establishment. “Al-Sisi is really popular, and he would be elected without any state support — not just because he is perceived as being the man who decided to end the very unpopular and clearly unfortunate rule of the Muslim Brotherhood, but also because I think he knew how to address the people in a way that suited their mindset. This is the case even if he has not been liked by some intellectuals, who have been arguing that at the end of the day Al-Sisi was a member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) that was appointed by [ousted former president Hosni] Mubarak and that ruled during the interim period following his ouster.” “On paper, this looks odd, but what really counts when it comes to the polling stations are the masses, and I happen to know that despite the SCAF's history and despite the political issues the people really do like Al-Sisi. From what I have seen in many governorates in the country, Al-Sisi could easily secure a 70 per cent victory. Forget landslide results of over 90 per cent, but he could make a clearly comfortable 70 per cent victory for sure,” Abul-Ghar said. However, how realistic is it to think that the state establishment will not support Al-Sisi? And how can Al-Sisi be a truly democratically elected president if he is elected without rallying or touring the nation as was the case with the presidential candidates during the race in 2012? Abul-Ghar stresses the security constraints that would prohibit Al-Sisi from touring the country, and, rallying or not, he is convinced that the army chief will be the winner. What he is not as certain about is the level of impartiality that the state will show once the candidacy is announced, probably in the first week of March. “There's so much that we will have to see. We are going through a very exceptional moment and things are not as straightforward as they could have been,” Abul-Ghar said. The future is not clear, he added, because while it is true that Al-Sisi could be democratically elected, it is not necessarily true that his rule will be democratic. “I cannot predict how things will go, because Al-Sisi might act as a military leader who expects his rule to be executed to the letter without any opposition. On the other hand, he might continue to act intelligently and listen to the people instead,” Abul-Ghar argued, seemingly in favour of the second scenario. It is not only the politically smart quality of Al-Sisi that Abul-Ghar is hoping for when it comes to the rule of the current head of the army. For this man who has long worked with the masses, “the people cannot be discarded. I am almost certain that no one, literally no one, can rule this nation with an iron fist. The next president, from a military background or not, must know that this is no longer possible.” The combination of a politically smart Al-Sisi and a hard-to-quell nation is already manifesting itself, Abul-Ghar argued, in the case of the protests by workers in Al-Mahalla Al-Koubra, an industrial centre in the Delta. “They have been protesting, and he has not touched them. He knows it, and they know it: the rules of the pre-25 January Revolution do not apply anymore. They cannot apply even if some who are reminiscent for the Mubarak regime hope that they will be once Al-Sisi is elected.” The reason why the iron fist can come into play with the Muslim Brotherhood and their supporters has to do with public support. “When the state deals with the Muslim Brotherhood, it knows that there is good part of society that is firmly at odds with this group,” he said. Even those liberals who have come under attack or have been harassed by the state are those who have shown some sympathy with the Muslim Brotherhood. There again, the state bodies are counting on “a Muslim Brotherhood phobia that does not seem to be going away soon or easily”. That said, Abul-Ghar is sure to add that there is no excuse for police brutality, often an outcome of “miserable police skills.” In his view, it was a “horrifying combination of brutality and inefficiency” that caused the dispersal of the Muslim Brotherhood sit-ins in Cairo last August to be so bloody. “They could have been dispersed without so much blood — or, had the police been really efficient, without any blood at all. But the police were inefficient, brutal and also vindictive,” Abul-Ghar argued. He added that it was the same police mentality that had caused shock this week when a young woman was forced to go into labour with her wrists in handcuffs. “I know this is shocking, but I also know that it is not the first time this has happened,” he added. As a newly practicing gynaecologist in the mid-1960s when “Nasser was hard at work arresting Muslim Brotherhood members including women” Abul-Ghar saw handcuffed women going into labour in police stations. “It is inexcusable, but it is the way the police mentality is, has been, and is likely to be in the future. Forget about prompt police reform because although this is necessary for the police and society, this is a very long-term and costly endeavour that is unlikely to be a priority of the next president who will be daunted by the endless challenges of the masses instead,” Abul-Ghar argued. While it is hard to fix, Abul-Ghar said that police brutality could at least be checked by the next president, both through the political will of a smart head of the executive and through the firm will of the people, whose shock and anger had forced the release of the woman handcuffed recently. Her release had indicated that the right mix of political sensitivity and public pressure could help lead the way away from autocratic practices mixed with human rights violations. Abul-Ghar said that there had been a decline in reports of torture by political activists held at police stations and other places “in the wake of a serious anti-torture campaign. I am not saying that torture has entirely stopped, nor am I expecting it to stop, but clearly there has been a decline,” he said. Along with the political awareness of the next president and the determination of the people not to fall under further autocratic rule, Abul-Ghar is also counting on the cabinet and the team of aides that the next president will work with. Abul-Ghar said that Amr Moussa, a veteran diplomat who during his chairmanship of the Committee of Fifty that revised the constitution “commanded the respect and admiration of many people, including some otherwise confirmed adversaries from all age groups,” was likely to be Al-Sisi's first prime minister. “I think this would be a good beginning, because what we need now is a good negotiator who can find middle-ground formulas between conflicting views, and Amr Moussa is a very good negotiator who can work for long hours at perfect ease with people from all backgrounds and from all age brackets. He is certainly very skilled and very much up to the job, and he also has wider public support than ever before,”Abul-Ghar said. The Al-Sisi-Moussa combination could be the best one for Egypt, Abul-Ghar said, especially if it gave due attention to four issues: “restrict the unhealthy media and security attacks on the political opposition; reach out and integrate the youth, including those who joined the Muslim Brotherhood after they came to power, in the pursuit of better opportunities; block the attempts of the remnants of the Mubarak regime to come back to centre-stage; and when the time is ripe find a way to heal the wounds related to the Muslim Brotherhood.” “Should Al-Sisi manage to walk this path, he would certainly have my support. I am hoping he will, but I cannot really judge at present,”Abul-Ghar said.
