Demonstrations are wreaking havoc on the traffic -- and the press, writes Fatemah Farag James Bond liked his shaken, not stirred, and at least some of the opposition seems to be refining its taste in favour of the bolder. One such independent figure is professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Qasr Al-Eini University Mohamed Abul-Ghar who attended one of last week's pro-reform anti-government rallies and was enraged to find himself "peacefully" penned in by dozens of policemen. Writing in Al-Arabi (3 April) Abul-Ghar was adamant. "Egyptian pressure applied by the masses of the people must continue because we want to change aspects of our life with our own hands. [Change] until the rest of the constitution [is amended], the re-nomination of president is confined to two terms and an end is brought to the state of emergency. These are the deep- rooted requests and rights of the Egyptian people who have no option but an incrementally escalated peaceful civilian resistance until freedom is achieved." And as Mohamed Hamad in the same issue of the weekly paper points out, "a country where demonstration is prohibited is a country whose people is deprived of the most basic of human rights -- the right to express pain." And if it is foreign intervention that bothers some, according to Hamad, "the national programme for a safe transferal to a democratic system must go beyond the programme that comes from abroad, not to accept some [of the foreign programme's] stipulations in an attempt to alleviate current pressure." Psychiatrist Yehia El-Rakhawi writing in Al- Ahram on 4 April considers the best system of governance to be that which is capable of correcting its faults. Hence, while he acquiesces that people's mass discontent, and their expression of that discontent, can be manipulated and used by unwanted forces, "it is also true that continued attempts and the correction of our course is only possible if no central authority attempts now or in the future to force its hegemony [over this process]." Mohamed Abdel-Moneim, editor-in-chief of Rose El-Youssef got caught in the traffic melt- down imposed by the security forces to contain one of the demonstrations as he headed to his office on Qasr Al-Eini Street. The hours he spent in traffic gave him even more time to direct his wrath, not at the security but the demonstrators. The events reflected a media conspiracy, the activities of those working as foreign agents, religious fundamentalism, communism and corrupt youth, wrote Abdel- Moneim in the 2-8 April issue of Rose El- Youssef. More reasonable concerns were voiced by Al- Musawwar 's Editor-in-Chief Makram Mohamed Ahmed on 1 April who said that what he fears the most in this "pandemonium which has taken over the political theatre in Egypt, in which internal and external pressures are intertwined... that in faulty mirrors, the size of certain people will be inflated and that they might believe themselves to be [our] tomorrow, the solution and the future." Again the increasingly materialising foreign intervention ghost casts an eerie spell over local efforts towards reform. Ragab El-Banna in October magazine (2 April) points out, "It is no secret that there are those in the current American administration who find the time right to defeat Arab countries without a war. With political and economic pressure from the one side, and well-known CIA operations from the other... and with the purchase of foreign agents, adventurists and those looking for a role in their country or money and are willing to sell everything in return." Reflecting the same fears, Al- Osbou on 4 April front-paged an item headlined: "[US Secretary of State Condoleezza] Rice opens the door to the Ikhwan (Brotherhood) while the paper's Editor-in-Chief Mustafa Bakri takes up Page 3 to unfold the details of a US report on how the administration can remove Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. According to Bakri, democracy schemes backed by the current US administration are nothing but plans to "take apart nations, steal resources, cut off nationalists and open the door for the age of hegemony -- US-Zionist hegemony." But in Al-Masri Al-Yom (4 April) Magdi Mehana calls upon his readers not to give in to the arguments that call for "security" considerations over that of "reform". He says, "most of the officials in most of the important positions in the state, in the parliament, government, presidency and media, think in terms of a security mind set... [as their] continuation in the positions is directly related to security considerations." He argues that if we want real reform and stability this is exactly the mind set that needs changing. But Ahmed El-Gamal in Al-Ahram on 3 April highlights the fact that most of the demonstrations are made up of the same people, a fact that detracts from both their effectiveness and legitimacy. "I believe that the marginalisation of economic-social issues from the direct circle of concern and the focus on political reform is one of the main reasons for the limited circle of the national movements." Does this bring us back to the democracy-or- development-first debate? Maybe, but since this was the week parliament took up the employment issue and the World Bank issued a report on poverty, the dismal condition suffered by a majority of the Egyptian people was at the fore of many concerns. Abbas Tarabili in Al-Wafd on 2 April lamented widespread poverty, mismanagement of resources and the lack of economic prioritisation, all of which he says have resulted in the current situation. "Does not all of this prove how bad the government's policies are, how incapable it is? As a result, half of the Egyptian population lives in poverty." In a one-page expose in Sawt Al-Umma (4 April) Adel Hamouda highlights the fact that "50 million Egyptian citizens in the countryside suffer oppression, poverty, cancer, kidney failure, unemployment, imprisonment and death of hunger." After all is said and done, Hamouda says any elections should be preceded by a good look at the plight of the Egyptian peasantry. While Talaat El-Maghawri in Al-Wafd on 3 April bashes the government for its responsibility in the unemployment of some 10 million citizens. And once again "foreign intervention" rears its dreaded head. Ismail Sabri Abdallah in Al- Ahali on 30 March comments on the US endorsement and choice of Paul Wolfowitz as the new head of the World Bank. "Now we face, under this new leadership, the absolute refusal of government intervention [in the economic sphere] and severe limitation of all connected to social development and requests for more privatisation." Abdallah obviously thinks this is a formula for further economic disparity, begging the question: what effect can more impoverishment have on the prospects and face of political reform.
