To avoid mass protests at the results the presidential elections must be demonstrably free of irregularities, reports Khaled Dawoud Tahrir Square was largely deserted on Friday despite a call by several radical youth groups for yet another demonstration demanding former members of the Mubarak regime be barred from running in the presidential elections. The campaign mainly targeted Ahmed Shafik, 71, Mubarak's last prime minister, and Amr Moussa, 76, who served as Mubarak's foreign minister for a decade. The so-called Friday of Popular Isolation was called for, among others, the 6 April Movement and Emsek Fulul (Catch a Remnant). They asked their supporters to walk around the streets tearing up posters placed by the Shafik and Moussa campaigns. A few banners and pictures were removed, only to be replaced by supporters of the two candidates. More worrying for the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) are threats by prominent Muslim scholars, the Muslim Brotherhood and Al-Jamaa Al-Islamiya that they will take to the streets for a "second revolution" should Shafik, in particular, be elected president. In a statement issued on Monday SCAF called upon Egyptians to "accept the outcome of the elections" and vowed that it will exert every effort to guarantee that the poll is free and fair. "It remains an open question whether Egyptians will accept the result of the elections, particularly if Shafik wins," says Nasser Amin, a lawyer and human rights activist. "If Shafik succeeds the Brotherhood and other liberal and leftist groups are likely to cry foul and claim that elections were rigged." Moussa has tried hard to distance himself from the former regime, claiming that during the decade in which he served as Arab League chief he had no relations with the Egyptian government. He also claimed that, in the decade before he took the Arab League post, he differed with Mubarak over many issues while serving as his foreign minister. His critics, however, have repeatedly replayed a statement Moussa made just months before Mubarak was forced from office, in which he supported the former president remaining for yet another six-year term. Commentators also point out that Moussa would not have been nominated by Mubarak to head the pan-Arab organisation had he not been seen as loyal to the regime. Details of Moussa's renumeration package at the Arab League remain vague, though it is known he received a $5 million pay off when he left the post a year ago. Abdel-Moneim Abul-Fotouh, the former Muslim Brother who is among the presidential frontrunners, says "Egyptians are not crazy to vote for a candidate who was part of the regime they forcibly removed a year ago." "We can't," he says, "resurrect the regime we revolted against." Following Mubarak's ouster on 11 February 2011 SCAF insisted on keeping Shafik in office for a few weeks, leading to charges that the army was seeking to limit change to the removal of the former president and his son, Gamal, who was being groomed to succeed. Following massive demonstrations, SCAF finally gave in and fired Shafik. Amid charges that the generals were refusing to meet the demands of the revolution in order to turn the public against it, deliberately allowing the economy and the security situation to deteriorate, relations went from bad to worse between SCAF and the youth groups that sparked the 25 January Revolution. Shafik began to slowly stage a comeback, eventually announcing that he would stand as a presidential candidate. When former General Intelligence chief and Mubarak loyalist Omar Suleiman announced his intention to run Shafik's position in the polls dipped. Suleiman was portrayed as the man Egypt needed to restore security, improve the economy and limit the growing influence of Islamist groups. The Presidential Elections Commission (PEC) eventually rejected Suleiman's application and Shafik regained his position as the leading candidate of the old order. MP Essam Sultan, the Wasat Party's deputy leader, spared no effort to try and prevent Shafik from running. First he proposed legislation that banned anyone who had occupied a senior position during the last 10 years of Mubarak's rule from running for public office. When the draft law was referred to the Supreme Constitutional Court Sultan then claimed he had documents showing that Shafik had sold state property to Mubarak's sons at a fraction of their market value. Essam's claims, along with other allegations of corruption against Shafik, are now being investigated by the prosecutor-general's office. Shafik denies any wrong doing. Sheikh Mazhar Shahin, a key figure in the 25 January revolt against Mubarak who has declared his support for Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Mursi, has said he will personally lead protests in Tahrir should Shafik win. "You [Shafik] claim I was the one who pushed for your removal in March [2011]. Well, I will do that again if elections are rigged in your favour and you win the presidency," said Shahin. Freedom and Justice Party MP Osama Yassin insists the presidential poll "is not a carnival or a celebration but a struggle of wills between those who express the goals of the revolution and its hopes, and those who want to revive the old regime". "If elections are rigged, or result in a president who belongs to the old regime, the youth will reproduce the revolution. If elections are rigged it will explode in seconds, and won't need any preparation. It will be a simultaneous act by all Egyptians." Asked what he would do if he was elected and a second revolution took place to oppose the result, Shafik said it would be "the responsibility of the army to intervene as it did in Abbasiya", a reference to the military's bloody crackdown on 4 May on protesters who had threatened to besiege the Defence Ministry. Nabil Fahmi, Egypt's former ambassador to the United States, finds the rhetoric of both sides disturbing. "I have strong reservations on both positions. Each reflect stands that belong to the past, portraying anyone who disagrees with you as a traitor. It makes clear that we have not yet absorbed the lessons of the revolution, or built institutions that can protect it," says Fahmi. photo: Sherif Sonbol
