The Muslim Brotherhood should back down from its efforts to control the totality of the Egyptian polity, including writing the constitution according to its whims, writes Ayman El-Amir* The struggle to build a new political order in post- revolution Egypt has hit a dead-end because the Muslim Brotherhood jumped the gun and the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) overreacted. Having achieved overwhelming victory in parliamentary elections, and dominated all major committees in the new parliament, the Brotherhood launched a barrage of attacks against Prime Minister Kamal El-Ganzouri's government to force it out of office and replace it with their own government. Heady with an unprecedented sense of power, the Brotherhood, through its Freedom and Justice Party in parliament, pounced on the planned selection of the Constituent Assembly to steamroll the drafting of the constitution. The Brotherhood and the Salafis joined hands and elected themselves to the majority seats of the 50- member quota assigned to parliament of the 100 members of the Constituent Assembly. They launched a virulent attack on SCAF, insinuating that by supporting the Ganzouri government, they were preparing to fix the presidential elections in favour of a chosen candidate. The SCAF responded with a stern statement, warning the Brotherhood of the consequences of "repeating the mistakes of history" -- a reference to Nasser's crackdown on the Brotherhood in 1954 and 1965. With a ravenous appetite for power, the Brotherhood overreached itself. It came out of parliamentary elections as the majority party, partly because of its religious appeal, partly by subterfuge and partly because liberal forces failed to persuade people that they have a viable programme that could tackle the country's chronic problems, as opposed to the Brotherhood's vague but soothing slogan "Islam is the solution." Electoral violation cases are still pending before the courts, some articles of the Constitutional Declaration of 19 March 2011 are being contested, and even the validity of the People's Assembly itself is being challenged on constitutional grounds. However, the Brotherhood behaves as if it has cornered all aspects of Egyptian political life. True to their political reputation, after seizing control of parliament, they are now angling for the executive branch of government and seeking to control the Constituent Assembly that would write the permanent constitution. This will straightjacket the judiciary, which will conduct business only according to the laws issued by the legislature and the rulings of the Supreme Constitutional Court. In February last year the Brotherhood and its party affirmed they would offer no candidate for the presidential elections and would even expel any member who would dare contest the race. One year later they continued to claim they would neither offer a candidate nor endorse one until the list of potential candidates has been closed. With 36 of the 50 members of the Constituent Assembly elected by the Brotherhood and Salafi MPs, the other 50 external members will be handpicked from among public figures to assure the Salafist-Brotherhood coalition of a comfortable majority in the 100-member assembly, with token representation for the Copts, unions, academia and the intelligentsia. So far, there are only three jurists and less than a handful of youth representatives from among those who originally launched the 25 January Revolution. In the absence of any impartial criteria for the selection of the Constituent Assembly members, the drafting of the constitution itself will be in jeopardy as the Salafist-Brotherhood coalition pursues a winner-takes-all strategy. It would lead to a constitution drafted along ideological lines, mainly the Brotherhood and the Salafis. And that could not, should not, be a permanent constitution. It was no surprise, therefore, that elected representatives from the Free Egyptians, the leftist Tagammu, Karama, the Popular Socialist Alliance and the National Association for Change parties, as well as independents, continue to withdraw from the assembly in protest. If SCAF should remind the Brotherhood of the so- called lessons of history, it should also be recalled that Egypt's first and most respected constitution was drafted in 1923 by a group of 18 legal experts and jurists, selected from a constituent committee of 30 members. Saad Zaghloul Pasha, the leader of the wildly popular Wafd Party, called it a "Committee of Rogues" which was unnecessary because the Wafd represented all shades of the nation that mandated it to negotiate with the British to secure the independence of Egypt. As the Wafd had this mandate, it should, or an assembly representing it should, be entrusted with drafting the constitution. Despite this opposition, a general committee representing all categories of the Egyptian society at the time, including Bedouins, was established. A group 18 members, consisting mostly of jurists and experts in jurisprudence, was selected to draft the general principles of the constitution. Opposition or no opposition, a handful of experts turned out one of the finest constitutions Egyptians are still proud of because it had no sectarian or partisan bias or political quotas. In the midst of this rising crisis between the military and Egyptian political Islam, the Muslim Brotherhood in war-torn Syria issued what it called the pledge and covenant of the organisation, committing itself to "a civic, democratic and pluralistic state," with no reference to Islamic Sharia. In Tunisia, the largest political movement, Al-Nahda, voted to keep unchanged the first article of the draft constitution, refusing to add the provision that Isalm is the main source of legislation. With the Muslim Brotherhood-Salafist partnership trying to scoop up all elements of political power, people were alerted to the fact that the coalition was yet another hungry political animal. The Brotherhood came out of forced political seclusion but saw the promise of freedom, justice and pluralism with a dungeon mentality. As the Brotherhood surprised itself by winning the parliamentary elections and emerging as the majority party, their reaction was: it is now or never. They reached out to other components of political power and started by harassing the Ganzouri government in the hope of overthrowing it. They announced that they were ready to replace it with a more efficient cabinet that would resolve all urgent domestic and foreign problems. Then they moved on to the composition of the Constituent Assembly to ensure that they have a controlling influence through their 50 per cent share in the assembly. They also had plans to fill the other 50 per cent of non-parliamentary seats with pro- Brotherhood sympathisers. Then they moved on to leak reports that, under the changing circumstances, they may reconsider their decision earlier not to field candidates for the presidency. Buoyed by their easy victory, the Brotherhood forgot that they won their majority in parliament by a combination of pious appearance and acts of charity for the poor. They partly filled the gap in goods and services that the Mubarak government failed to address. However, charity does not make a government with a vision, policy and action plan. They were elected by an electorate that included a 30 per cent illiterate population. They came to power on a religious, not civic, platform -- a power that they will seek to replicate and consolidate in all aspects of the political order. It will be impossible, for example, to vote a government they form out of office by a vote of no confidence or to kill any draft law they may wish to pass. Through the Constituent Assembly, they will turn out a constitution that could hardly be contested before the Supreme Constitutional Court. The ultimate objective is to turn Egypt into a theocratic state, ruled by sheikhs and fatwas. The religious majority in parliament is counting on inciting mass demonstrations in Tahrir Square to bully the military council. But, despite all propaganda to the contrary, Egyptians know that the Muslim Brotherhood, that initially said it would not participate in the 25 January Revolution, were latecomers and supported it only when they realised they were missing the train, while Salafis opposed it as a rebellion against the God-ordained ruler, which is un-Islamic. The religious coalition in parliament is now at loggerheads not only with SCAF but also with a significant majority of other democratic forces. Their show of arrogance towards other social forces, including accusing the Supreme Constitutional Court of manipulating the SCAF to pressure the coalition, means they will wait for the right time to discipline the court and bring it in line with their own wishes. In order to contain the situation and save the bloodshed that could again mark Tahrir Square the Brotherhood will have to come back to its senses. One gesture of goodwill to correct the transgressions they have committed is to back off from offering a presidential candidate and withhold open or tacit support, or opposition, to anyone else. That may help take the steam out of the mad engine of religious partisanship. It should also re-examine the quota system for forming the Constituent Assembly -- a quota that was established by subterfuge a few minutes before voting on the makeup of the assembly. * The writer is former corespondent of Al-Ahram in Washington, DC, and former director of the UN Radio and Television in New York.
