By Ammar Ali Hassan Twice in the span of 10 days, President Hosni Mubarak spoke of the political vitality that exists in this country, noting that it is the product of amendments he introduced to Article 76 of the Egyptian constitution. The president slammed those "who confuse change with chaos... calculated actions with uncalculated adventure." Commentators would later wonder if the comments contained an implicit threat to potential challenger Mohamed El-Baradei. But few questioned the underlying assumption of the president; namely, that he inspired political vitality in the country. One has to go back to the year 1982, when the opposition submitted its first initiative for reform, to show who is responsible for the political vigour in Egypt. There have been thousands of initiatives, suggestions and recommendations given for reform, countless newspaper articles commending freedom and exposing corruption, dozens of appeals, and swathes of advice at every turn -- all the work of the opposition and democracy advocates in Egypt. Starved for freedom, the nation leapt at the first opportunity to form parties. When this didn't go well, Egyptians turned to syndicates, to non- governmental organisations, to civil society and rights groups. At each step of the way, the government tried its best to stop the people from obtaining the freedom they so craved. For the last six years, the country has seen the emergence of new types of political and social movements: Kifaya, 6 April, and all the rest of it. All preceded the amendment of Article 76. In fact, it was the vitality of these movements that impelled the president to change his mind about the constitution. For long, the president's declared view was that constitutional change was out of the question. As privatisation policies suffocated the workers, as a new agricultural rent law impoverished peasants, and as corruption took its toll on the bureaucracy, the nation reacted. The independent press spoke out against injustice. Political activists tried to break the shackles of despotism. And protesters found their way to the front doors of downtown syndicates. This country has seen more than 2,500 protests in five years. Most of these protests were professional in content and political intent. We all know that. This week's Soapbox speaker is a political analyst.
