Gamal Nkrumah follows the arguments for and against the extended emergency law The decision on Tuesday to extend the emergency law for two more years literally opened a Pandora's box. At home, the case for political renewal is irrefutable. There are those who see the watered-down version of the extended law as part of the averred political reform and those who see it as a setback. How do the rival political factions, therefore, measure up to this prospectus? All parties believe that they are right on their perspective on civil liberties. The debate that erupted in parliament and in the media as well as in foreign capitals revealed the wide gap between those who viewed the move positively and those who dismiss it both at home and abroad. Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif maintained that as much as the government disliked the state of emergency it was "obliged" to request an extension until May 2012. While members of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) termed the measure as "revolutionary", independent dailies such as Al-Masry Al-Yom and Al-Shorouk described it respectively as "a new look" and "cosmetic". "This law is a blow to civil liberties and stripping Egypt of becoming a truly civilian state because it gives sweeping powers to police forces," warned Mohamed El-Beltagui, Muslim Brotherhood affiliated MP. Nasserist Karama Party MP Hamdeen Sabahi tritely called it the "lesser of two evils" though he omitted defining each of the "evils". Ironically Washington's tepid "disappointment" with the measure is not far from Sabahi's. International human rights organisations also deplored the development. Amnesty International sounded the alarm bell, stressing that it "deplores Tuesday's renewal of the state of emergency. Egypt's decision, it claims, "authorises giving the security forces especially the State Security Intelligence officials carte blanche to continue using the repressive emergency powers that have led to numerous abuses." Human Rights Watch decried the extension of the emergency laws, arguing that Egypt "breaches again its 2005 promise. Instead of cosmetic changes to the emergency law, the government needs to repeal it and restore the basic laws of its citizens." Given that this high-minded intervention is well- intentioned, officials of the ruling National Democratic Party noted, it comes at a time when Western nations are themselves intensifying their anti- terrorism precautions and stiffening the legal and security measures to counter terrorism. "The reaction of the US has gone astray," thundered Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit. Other top-level officials concurred. "This time round, the detractors of the country have no credible excuse whatsoever. They have a lame excuse. The new emergency laws are limited to terrorism and drug trafficking. Nothing more, nothing less. Egypt's emergency laws are therefore in line with the anti-terrorism laws in force in most Western nations," Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee of the People's Assembly Mustafa El-Feki told Al-Ahram Weekly. El-Feki said, "although US President Barack Obama vowed that the Guantanamo Bay detention centre would be closed, he has not been able to do so until now and America is even taking more preemptive measures to face terrorism." In much the same vein as local opposition groups, the United States expressed criticism of the move. "The US is disappointed by the Egyptian government's decision to extend the state of emergency which has been in effect continuously since 1981, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said in a statement on Tuesday. "We call on the Egyptian government to fulfil its pledge to the Egyptian people to replace the emergency law with a counter-terrorism law that protects the civil liberties of Egyptian citizens," Gibbs added. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton concurred noting that, "a broad range of Egyptian voices" is seeking an end to the emergency laws. That, she said, "would be a step forward if it means greater protection of civil liberties for Egyptian citizens in practice," Clinton added. "We urge Egypt to complete its promised counter-terrorism legislation on an urgent basis and repeal the state of emergency." Within parliament there was a tsunami of conflicting reactions. "As for local human rights groups and opposition parties, they never stop making political capital out of the defaming of the country abroad," El-Feki concluded. "The subject itself is banal and deflects attention from the far more pertinent concerns gripping the country and the entire region," Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, the dean of Arab political commentary, told Al-Ahram Weekly. "The issue of the emergency laws is an aside, a distraction from the critical concerns of the nation. The emergency laws have been with us for the past 29 years. They have been regularly renewed, so what is new? What is the fuss in the media all about? The United States knows exactly what is going on in Egypt. It has turned a blind eye to the situation in the country and so it is rather puzzling that it feigns concern now," Heikal extrapolated. "The whole discourse concerning the state of emergency is a non-issue. It is tedious and wearisome. This has been a recurrent and verbose farce, an inconsequential rant of the sensationalist media for nearly three decades now," Heikal explained.
