By Sayed Yasin In my first article on the Arab Spring revolutions, published in Al-Ahram newspaper January 27th, 2011, I wrote about the rebellious riots in Tunisia. The term ‘Arab Spring' was not yet used. The image was not very clear then; the incident that occurred in Tunisia seemed to be an isolated one: a young Tunisian (Bou Azizi) torched himself in protest against police brutality, triggering several protests and demonstrations to prevail Tunisian cities. The end result was a huge demonstration in the capital city, forcing the former President Ben Ali to flee the country. The first article on the Tunisian revolution was written prior to the Egyptian uprising on January 25th, 2011, but it was published on the 27th. We were taken by surprise, not only as political researchers, but also as average citizens. We did not expect a limited demonstration organized by a group of political activists on Facebook to transform into a huge uprising in which millions participated. Men and women filled Al Tahrir square, shouting various slogans against former President Mubarak, until reaching the main slogan, "the people want to topple the regime". This slogan had spread around many other Arab nations, yet, strangely enough, it did actually lead to the collapse of the authoritarian Egyptian regime. This collapse took eighteen glorious days to occur, thus recording a historical event that is rather rare in human history. The title of my first article about the Tunisian revolution was, ‘Continuous Questions on the Revolution', in which I said the day of the revolution – any revolution – is very important; however, the revolution's ‘day after' is not in any way less, but in reality more important. The logic behind this decisive statement is that, toppling a political regime by coup or revolution may seem quite possible, particularly if you are considering that the country may be passing through a revolutionary incubation phase, a one where waves of indignation against tyranny, authoritarian systems and social injustice grow. However, what is much more difficult than toppling a regime is rebuilding another. The requirements of a new political regime that will meet political and socioeconomic public ambitions for those revolting should be a priority. Before venturing to build a new political regime, we need to have a clear futuristic vision for possibilities. Therefore, we need to determine how can we confront the great political challenges that are bound to emerge after toppling the old one? So what will be the political powers calling the shots, controlling the scene, and leading the democratization process? Will it be from the hope- glowed youth with high ambitions, or will it rather be the politically experienced classic powers? Will experienced classic powerful politicians be able to steal the revolution? Be that through a fabricated democratic election, or as a result of a political overthrow. This is a pivotal question actually, because if we get to analyze the political scene in both Tunisia and Egypt after revolution, we will be able to find an answer. First, in both Tunisia and Egypt, those who initialized the revolution were multitudes of political activists who lacked any political configuration, such as a party or a group strongly related to the public on the streets. That explains that when Tunisia started its post- revolution phase, a transitional council was formed. All the political society was surprised when the Nahda religious party got the majority. It would have been impossible for Tunisia to safely cross such a serious lane of struggle, had Al Nahda party monopolized the political scene, excluding all the rest of political powers, whether liberal or secular. El-Nahda leader, Sheikh Rashid al-Ghannushi's wisdom evaded Tunisia an extremely violent political struggle, which could have evolved into a civil war. He distributed all the high-ranking posts of the President, Prime Minister, and Head of the Transitional Council among all active parties. This allowed the whole transitional phase to take an initial step in political harmony. Political crisis naturally started during inclinations towards constitution drafting. Al Nahda leaders' political flexibility circumvented these problems, giving away some of its religious ideologies for the sake of political agreement. The same, praise-worthy attitude was observed during the Presidential election for which Al Nahda party, due to some insightful calculations, did not venture to propose a candidate. The elections then brought President Essebsi, who hails from Nedaa Tunis secular Party, to power. In a democratic spirit, Sheikh Rashid al-Ghannushi sent a congratulating message to the elected President, a message harshly condemned by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB) radical preacher Wagdy Ghoniem. The preacher exclaimed, as a videotape revealed, "How can we congratulate Essebsi since he is secular and an infidel too?!" This of course illustrates MB's radicalism, which has really made them meet their demise rather rapidly. The Egyptian public revolted against their dictatorial rule. Tunisia managed to democratically confront political challenges on the day after the revolution; they are now left to deal with development challenges. What about the situation in Egypt? The day after revolution was when the former President Mubarak stepped down and gave delegation to the military council to run the country; this was actually the start of a severe political strife in Egypt. Egypt witnessed huge demonstrations named ‘milionias' meaning ‘of millions' led by the Muslim Brotherhood to oppose other huge demonstrations, of millions too, by the liberals. This really illustrated the serious social cultural crack. The MB failed to manage the state affairs taking absolute control through a parliamentary election, an election that held many suspicions regarding social and religious fraud. Mixing religion with politics was among the paradigms abused for election gains. In addition, the MB threatened they would have burned down the country if the presidential election committee had not announced the victory of Mohamed Morsi against his competitor Ahmed Shafik; there was a slight ignorable numeric vote difference. Among political observers, there was almost a settled belief that the Military Supreme Council had actually yielded to MB's blackmail. Hence, the victory of Mohamed Morsi was announced, prompting all his supporters to take to streets in jubilant celebrations. Those taking to streets were under the false impression this Presidency announcement was actually the declaration of the birth of the theocratic state in Egypt, upon the ruins of the Secular one. Confirming the cause of celebration, former MB Murshid (Supreme religious Guide) Mohamed Badie stated, "It looks like Hassan Al Banna's dream (founder of the Muslim Brotherhood) was about to come true". Neither did the MB guide nor his group realize the extreme difficulty of changing the identity of a society, or demolish the whole edifice of a country like Egypt. They were acting as if the square, the center of revolution, was void of any but the Muslim Brotherhood. Contrary to the Tunisian peaceful transition from an authoritarian phase to a democratic one, Egypt's transitional phase stumbled heavily until the people were able to topple the MB regime on June 30. On that day, the then Defense Minister, Al Sisi declared a Road Map of which two steps, the new constitution and the Presidency election, have already been completed. Only the parliamentary elections still remain as the last step. We can confidently say that Tunisia, despite reaching a safe haven as far as democracy is concerned, will have to face development challenges seeking effective resolutions. The same applies to Egypt. The public - after the parliamentary election- will raise the question: Out of the January revolution goals, what has actually been achieved, as far as political freedom and social justice are concerned? We can comfortably say whatever the political challenges may be for any revolution's "day after", the criterion of assessing its success resides in meeting the development challenges successfully, be that in Tunisia or in Egypt.
