Four days after Egypt's run-off elections, the country still does not know who its new president is. The name will be made public today but because the two rivals are claiming victory, whoever is proclaimed the winner, an announcement either way by the election commission could raise protests, and instigate violence, from the losing side. The two camps, representing Ahmed Shafik, Hosni Mubarak's ex-prime minister, and Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood, claim that their respective tallies of ballots make their man the winner of the first presidential elections since Mubarak was forced to step down following a nationwide revolt early last year. Whoever is president will find his powers curtailed. The ruling military council this week issued several decrees that allow it to maintain a grip on power. The generals are, for instance, to replace the 100-member panel selected by parliament to draft a new constitution. Liberals and others had boycotted the panel to protest against what they said was its domination by Islamists, the same reason that led to the dissolution of a previous panel by a court ruling. Thus the military will now control the drafting of a new constitution, the third major blow in a week to hopes for a democratic transition that arose from the uprising. On Wednesday last week, the military gave itself broad powers to arrest civilians even on minor offences such as traffic violations. And on Thursday, a court dissolved the parliament whose majority Islamists have since been defying the scrapping of the legislature as illegal. Topping it off, the military council issued another decree on Monday forming a new national defence council made up of 11 senior military commanders, including the defence minister, as well as the president. Though the council's mandate was not specified, it appears to be another step towards reinforcing the role of the military as the highest authority over national security policy. The Armed Forces' buttressing up of its powers has drawn sharp responses from Washington, which urged the army to hand over "full power" to civilians, and at home, mainly by the Brotherhood who packed Tahrir Square in protest on Tuesday. Fortunately, the Brotherhood does not appear to want a confrontation with the ruling generals but has made it clear the army did not have the right to curb presidential powers after a vote the group says its candidate won. It's a shame that the elections are being overshadowed by what many consider a last-minute drive by the military to consolidate as much power as it can before the 1 July deadline approaches for the transfer of power from the ruling Armed Forces to a civilian government. The elections should be trumping all other issues for they are truly historic. If Mursi is confirmed in the official results expected today, he would be the first Islamist head of state of Egypt -- and the first civilian after four presidents from the military -- turnarounds in Egyptian politics as stunning as the wave of pro-democracy uprisings that swept Egypt and many other Middle East countries starting last year. A Shafik win would not be as remarkable; he is a former air force commander and ex-minister. His very history means an extension of the Mubarak regime that the revolution toppled. That somebody from that era is not only still standing but vying for the presidency means to many that neither the revolution nor those who launched it have gotten very far. It is not yet clear who will rule Egypt and who the real leaders will be. What is clear is that Egypt's passage from revolution to democracy has been as agonised as it has been historic.
