Whether or not he makes a full recovery and resumes power, President Hosni Mubarak’s recent illness has reminded us that Egypt is likely to face a transfer of power sometime in the next few years. What has also become apparent is how woefully unprepared the country is for that change. Mubarak may well have thought he had made the necessary arrangements for his eventual departure. For years it has been widely assumed that he was grooming his son Gamal to someday take his place in the Presidential Palace or, perhaps, the General Intelligence Service director, Omar Suleiman. All that changed, though, when former International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei came back to Egypt last month calling for changes to the Constitution. Suddenly, all of the pent-up hopes for democracy and open elections, which had been dashed every time an Ayman Nour or a Saad Eddin Ebrahim was jailed, came flooding back. Here was a figure—a hero, really—seemingly untouchable by the regime. The regime must have felt as though the rug had been pulled out from under it. For years it had successfully quashed any opposition by jailing anyone who grew too popular and, when necessary, changed the Constitution to make it impossible for any candidate to emerge as a realistic alternative. With ElBaradei, though, none of that would work. Regardless of what any individual country may feel about him, the international community wouldn’t be able to stand by and let Egypt arrest the Nobel Peace Prize winner just for criticizing the ruling party. So the genie is out of the bottle, it seems. The electorate is emboldened and increasingly vocal in its demands for open elections. One of the most vibrant activist groups in Egypt, the April 6 Youth Movement, has been collecting signatures on a statement in support of the Constitutional changes proposed by ElBaradei. All of this may seem promising to those hoping for open presidential elections, and, of course, in one sense it is. But it is also troubling. There are plenty of things working against the success of democratic elections in Egypt. For starters, there is the electorate itself. One of America’s founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, said that self-government is not possible unless citizens are educated and well-informed. Here in the United States, with our high literacy rates, free press and 200-plus years of democracy have a hard enough time. At times, American voters are poorly informed and easily manipulated. By the above standards, Egypt’s voting public is even less prepared for free elections than ours. Egypt, which suffers from lower literacy and higher poverty rates than the United States, has an electorate even more susceptible to the influence of propaganda. Add to that widespread and deeply entrenched corruption and you find a situation in which the possibility of real self-rule seems slim. None of this is to say Egyptians shouldn’t try — even insist — on a democratic approach to transition. If anything, they should push even more strongly to move the country in a direction that would allow for the wishes of the public to be heard. ElBaradei sowed some potent seeds in the Egyptian soil. A responsible regime would see that change is inevitable and that in the interest of its people it should begin to lift the restrictions that currently make a fair election impossible. And, as the 6 April Youth Movement and other groups have begun doing, concerned Egyptian citizens should not only hold the regime accountable in whatever way possible, but also work to make sure the voting public is ready to shoulder the heavy responsibility of democracy. BM **The beliefs and statements of all Bikya Masr blogumnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect our editorial views.
