What lessons do earlier revolutions hold for Egypt's revolution, asks Ahmad Naguib Roushdy* Although the 25 January Revolution caught the world by surprise and became an example for the Arab Spring, the occupiers of Wall Street, and British, Italian and Polish protestors, it has still not achieved most of its goals. Former president Hosni Mubarak was forced out, and this was a source of national pride, but the movement stopped there, and it is still crawling. The cleansing of corruption, tyranny and the remnants of the military regime will take a long time and will require the continued vigilance of the revolutionaries. Although I was optimistic that this would happen, today I fear that actions committed by the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) may prevent the awakening from continuing. Having lived under authoritarian regimes for thousands of years, the Egyptians have become the most timid people on earth. However, on 25 January last year, Egypt's young people refused to follow in the footsteps of their parents and grandparents and accept the military regime that started with the late president Gamal Abdel-Nasser and continued under Anwar El-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak. Yet, after the removal of Mubarak things continued as if he was still ruling, which is why an earlier article I wrote in the Weekly was entitled "Is the Revolution in Danger?" The million revolutionaries who gathered in Tahrir Square and other areas of the country on 19 April indicates that the Revolution is now trying to shield itself against the SCAF's attempts to sabotage it and to renege on its promise to help in the transition to a civilian government. Festooned along Tahrir Square were banners that should be a warning to the SCAF leaders that the Egyptians want them out. The media reported that a crowd of revolutionaries was singing, "down, down, down with military rule." It is true that the road to freedom is strewn with rocks and sacrifices. But the new awakening must continue in spite of the obstacles. Other nations' revolutions also experienced setbacks, but persistence and good planning paved the road to freedom, ending authoritarian regimes. Past revolutions also took a long time to reach their goals. Two of them, the American and the French, made an impression on and influenced each other, notwithstanding the fact that the revolutionaries were different people, from different societies and spoke different languages. A short comparison between these two revolutions and the Egyptian one may be a guide for future Egyptian revolutionaries. The American Revolution was not against an authoritarian government . At the time of the Revolution, America was not an independent country, but instead consisted of a federation of English colonies, and authority was limited to orders issued by the British Crown to protect its own interests. As a result of English repression, the Americans went to war against the occupier. While the war was ongoing, the US Congress, on 4 July, 1776, promulgated the Declaration of Independence in the name and on behalf of the colonies, asserting and proclaiming their independence from the British Crown. By this act, the Americans vindicated their pretensions to political autonomy and announced themselves to the world as a free and independent nation. They then continued the war as an independent country, ending it with the defeat of the British army. 4 July was announced as Independence Day, a national holiday that has always been celebrated in the United States by parades and marching bands. A Bill of Rights was declared, and then a constitution was enacted in 1789 that would be applied to all the states. Freedom of expression and freedom of the press were clearly recognised by the first amendment to the constitution in 1791. However, in spite of this, these vital rights were later abused, and it took the US federal courts 146 years after the enacting of the amendment to interpret it in such a way as to enforce the great structure of American liberty that was the basis for the democratic system. In 1861, civil war between the northern and the southern states erupted, with the intention of freeing black people from slavery in the south. The war was ferocious, and it ended in the defeat of the southern states. Although slavery was then abolished, many states continued discriminatory and segregatory policies against blacks and coloured people, especially in buses, trains, schools, jobs, and restaurants, until president Lyndon Johnson promulgated the Civil Rights Act in 1965. However, it took the peaceful struggle of Martin Luther King, the black American leader, and his assassination in 1968 and new fears of civil war, this time between black and white Americans, before the Act was put in place. Women did not have the right to vote or to run for public office, but they kept protesting in order to gain these things in spite of many of them being beaten and imprisoned until they won suffrage in the 1920s close to the time that Egyptian women won theirs. The latter is a stage that some revolutions still have to reach. Although the American Revolution preceded and inspired the French, it was the French philosophers, statesmen and jurists who opened American eyes to their miserable situation under British rule. Before the Revolution the French people were suffering under an authoritarian monarchical regime. The French kings claimed divine right to rule, and Louis XIV was even famous for the slogan l'état c'est moi (I am the state). When it came, the French Revolution started as a bread riot similar to those in Egypt during the rule of former presidents El-Sadat and Mubarak. Students of this Revolution remember how the French royalty were living in ivory towers at the time, isolated from their people, and historians tell us that when the queen, Marie Antoinette, the Austrian wife of Louis XVI, asked why the people were demonstrating, she was told they could not find bread, which was too expensive to buy. She was surprised and said they should eat cake instead, which was a luxury only the rich could afford. The queen never had to go to bed hungry. The Revolution extended its demands to the end of the royal family, liberty, freedom, and equality. On 14 July, 1789, the revolutionaries smashed the gates of the Bastille, a fortress that had been turned into a horrible prison, and freed those within who had been detained without trial. That day was later commemorated as a French national holiday, and the associated hymn, the marseillaise, became the national anthem. Like the American Revolution, the French Revolution could not have succeeded without shedding the blood of thousands. After capturing the king and his wife, who were trying to escape, the revolutionaries executed them along with many aristocrats and their cronies. Then a power struggle started between the leaders of the Revolution, which ended in the arrest and execution of many of the revolutionaries by their previous fellows in the struggle. The blades of the guillotine were kept sharpened for many days and nights and were used to cut off the heads of thousands. Although the French had suffered for a long time under authoritarian monarchs, the political transition to a democratic republic took many years, during which Napoleon Bonaparte ruled as emperor, abolishing the first French republic. The new constitutions that then followed allowed several French rulers to extend or abuse their powers. In a similar way, it will be a long time before Egyptians are able to feel free and to have a real democracy, though one hopes the road will not be a bloody one. In Tahrir Square on 19 April, it was reported that some revolutionaries were singing, "the people want the execution of the field marshal," and if that were to happen there would also be calls for the execution of Mubarak, former interior minister Habib al-Adly and others who were behind the killing of 800 people in the Revolution and who ruled the country with an iron fist for 30 years. However, it is apparent that most revolutionaries have thought that the toppling of Mubarak is enough. With the winning of a majority of the seats in the new Egyptian parliament by the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis, and the threat by the military to continue their grip on the country's government, a new situation has arisen that does not promise the development of a democratic system in Egypt. As a result, the revolutionaries may now have to fight on three fronts, against the ruling military in order to gain freedom, equality and democracy, and then against each other as happened in the United States and France. The third fight will be against the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis. We have seen how these two groups hijacked the Egyptian Revolution after it had gained momentum and how they started to show their greed for power, something they did not dare to do during Mubarak's rule. Will the Islamists try to crush a new youth revolution if they succeed in establishing an Islamic state in Egypt, and will they impose new laws according to their strict interpretation of Sharia law? Similar questions were raised at the end of my article in the Weekly on 15 March, but I hoped then that the members of the SCAF would not be reckless enough to allow the killing and imprisoning of more revolutionaries to continue. I do not expect the members of the SCAF to do what the former Tunisian president, Zein El-Abidin Ben Ali, did in fleeing the country. But after reviewing the past and recent events, I am sorry to say that the SCAF is now telling the revolutionaries to shut up and return to their bottles. I also raised the question in my previous article of whether the SCAF could be expected to resign after the election of a new president or after the enacting of a new constitution. Muhammad al-Kholi, spokesman for the SCAF Consultative Council, said he was sure that this would happen in an interview with Akhbar al-Youm published on 27 January, 2012. In the Weekly of 15 March, Dina Ezzat wrote that a source close to members of the military council (I wonder if this was al-Kholi himself?) had stated that SCAF members "all plan to retire on 1 July." The source was quoted as adding that "whether people like it or not, it was the SCAF that made it difficult for Mubarak to hand the presidency on to his son and that stopped Habib al-Adly from crushing the Revolution." The source is assuming that the SCAF acted to protect the Revolution, but of course without the pressure of the revolutionaries, the SCAF would never have forced Mubarak out. Only when the SCAF had realised that the Revolution was gaining momentum and that Mubarak had become a liability and might be forced to resign, which would have ended the military regime and with it the massive fringe benefits the military enjoys, did the SCAF replace Mubarak in ruling the country. The source was reported as adding that "this does not mean the SCAF is willing to compromise the status of the military in any future political set-up." I am sure that the source was referring to the Declaration of Principles that the SCAF announced last September here, insisting that these be included in the new constitution without subjecting them to a referendum like the other articles of the constitution. In this way, it became crystal clear that the military intended to continue its grip on future civilian governments, as I explained in my article in the Weekly on 28 June, 2011, when I referred to the broad lines of these principles, reported by the media in March. By preventing the public from voting on these principles, the SCAF made itself higher than the constitution, which is the highest law of the land, and higher, too, than the people, which is sovereign and which the SCAF is suppose to serve. Beside provisions in the Declaration regarding the separation of powers, the executive branch, the legislature and the judiciary, the principles would make the armed forces the protectors of the country's security and would give them a mandate to protect national unity and the secular character of the government. Would the SCAF thus be able to prevent the Islamist groups from forming a sectarian government, or enacting laws based on their understanding of the Sharia? The principles would also shield the country's defence budget from scrutiny by the People's Assembly and from auditing by the Central Authority for Auditing. This would also apply to profits from the Armed Forces Economic Foundation, these having benefited thousands of military top brass and other officers and making them loyal to Mubarak and his predecessor El-Sadat. This Foundation has been dealing in electronics, jeeps, hotels, bakeries, bottled water and wedding halls (wedding halls!). It was reported in the domestic and international media last December that a military spokesman had denied the existence of the Foundation, and that the defence budget in Egypt, like, he said, in other countries, was immune from scrutiny by parliament. Only the national security committee in parliament, he was reported to have said, could be informed about the budget. This is not true. In all democratic nations, parliaments review and approve the defence budget, either separately or as part of the general budget, and they can make amendments to it. It was reported after the spokesman had made his statement that the US Congress had reviewed and approved the US armed forces budget, after cutting several categories of new weapons. In her article, Dina Ezzat also wrote that according to the source the SCAF was "genuinely concerned" that the election of a president who was "insufficiently wise" could leave Egypt facing "unpredictable problems -- economic, political, or even military." She added that "others argue that the military is intent on retiring from centre stage, while still keeping its hand on the levers of real power." This is the core of the Declaration of Principles mentioned above. How can the SCAF be allowed to violate the constitution? If such a president is legally elected by the people, how can he be removed except under provisions in the constitution or by pressure of a new revolution? Do the armed forces intend to take over the government again and again until a "wise president" is elected, watching him to ensure that he does not become "unwise"? You need to be a wise person yourself to discover that another person is unwise. Do the members of the SCAF consider themselves to be the only wise people in the country? If so, why hide behind democracy when they could frankly declare their intention of continuing to rule the country, as Mubarak and his two predecessors did? It is the military who are pulling the strings now. The election system in Egypt that the SCAF has not attempted or does not want to change, along with the more than one third of voters who are illiterate and more than 50 per cent who live under the poverty line, has helped the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis to win the majority of the seats in the new parliament, and it will produce some unqualified and "unwise" presidents who could drive the military to step in again and again. It is shameful to see that the present and past constitutions do not require literacy in voters and in candidates for parliament or for the presidency, which has encouraged hundreds of people to apply to run for president. Former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was able almost to eliminate illiteracy and establish a good educational system in Iraq. It is not the number of university graduates that counts, but the quality of education and culture. Egypt is in dire need of a campaign to eliminate illiteracy and to allow only those who can read and write to vote. There are private institutions that have been making the education of people in popular areas their priorities. One of these is the Rowad (Pioneers) Society, which has been doing this since its establishment in the 1920s in two of its centres in Misr al-Qadima and Al-Qolaly. However, a lack of funds has prevented the Society from expanding its efforts. University students should not be allowed to graduate until it has been shown that they have taught a number of illiterate people how to read and write. Mandatory elementary education should exist in every city in Egypt, as well as in the countryside, as it did during my generation in the 1930s and 40s. What, then, will happen in Egypt now? I raised this question in the Weekly on 15 March, and I am raising it again now. It is a very difficult question to answer. It is true that the deposition of Mubarak was not easy, but he was only the caretaker of the military regime and was replaced by the SCAF against the revolutionaries' goals and expectations. Will the newly elected People's Assembly establish a real democracy in the country by enacting laws that preserve the people's rights to freedom of expression, of the press, assembly, and of religion, as well as equality for all people, women and men, and the establishment of due process of law? How much democracy can the Muslim Brothers and Salafis believe in, when they have already revealed their intention to establish al-khilafa (the caliphate) in Egypt that would impose their strict interpretation of the Sharia on all citizens, Muslim and Christian alike, many of whom struggled together for the Revolution? Imposing the rules of a religion on a people who do not want them is against the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Charter of the United Nations, of which Egypt is a party, and it could cause the United Nations to impose sanctions on Egypt. Would Egyptian Muslim men necessarily become pious believers and good citizens if they grew their beards down to their knees and dressed in short galabiyyas, as the members of some Salafi groups do? Would the Egyptian police, from lieutenants to generals, do a better job in the service of the people if they grew their beards as the Islamist groups want them to do? How about the army, or everyone else in the country, even if there is no provision in the Sharia requiring it of them? Have the Islamist groups ever considered women's opinions of their husbands being obliged to grow their beards? Would Egyptian Muslim women be more pious if they wore the niqab, the full face veil? Has this made Saudi women more pious and more respectable than Muslim women in other parts of the world? The problem is that the Islamists concern themselves with gender matters more than they do with the real issues of life. Without moving to correct the economic, political and social malaise of Egyptian society, all their efforts "would be naught," Steven Cook correctly concluded in his recent book The Struggle for Egypt. From Nasser to Mubarak. Clearly, Egypt, or, for that matter, any other Arab country that has got rid of its oppressive dictator, is not going to turn into a real democracy overnight, and reasonable people would not expect it to do so. The elections to the People's Assembly and Shura Council could have been one step forward if the majority of those who voted had been literate and the Islamist majority had been keen to serve the people and had not been craving for power. Strong medicine can kill the patient if taken in one dose. The same is true of democracy. Egypt's revolutionaries should not despair, but they need to be persistent and to participate in the political process. They should believe in the country's future, work hard for the growth of the economy, and try to build a good civil life. These things need open-minded rulers and legislators, and above all they need a country of literate people who believe in their rights to freedom, dignity, equality, and life without fear of tyranny, intimidation, and terror. Such things are necessary if Egypt is to resume its role in world civilisation. * The author is an international lawyer.
