CAIRO - During a recent conversation with a Western diplomat in Cairo, he told me that the question for the West is no longer: How will the Muslim Brotherhood act if they reach power? "The persistent question is: Are there competent rivals to the Muslim Brotherhood? Over the past four months, the Brotherhood, being well organised, have dispelled a lot of Western fears, raised by the former regime, about the risks to the West if they came to power," he explained. I was not surprised by the question. Though I have a lot of reservations about this Islamist group's agenda and manipulative moves, I have to admit that they are smart tacticians. Their plans are tailor-made for the prevailing circumstances. Having been freed last February from an official ban lasting more than 50 years, the Brotherhood have been at pains in the post-Mubarak era to allay fears inside and outside Egypt that they do not seek to monopolise the political scene and establish a puritanical Islamic state. I think they have gone a long way to achieving this. In creating their first political party, Freedom and Justice, the politically shrewd group have chosen a Coptic activist, Rafiq Habib, to be its deputy chairman. The gesture is apparently meant to win over sceptical Christians. At the same time, the 83-year-old group have declared that they will not nominate a presidential candidate or support any member who runs for president as an independent. Likewise, though being Egypt's most well-organised group, the Brotherhood have said they will contest 30 to 50 per cent of the parliamentary seats in the forthcoming elections. "On May 27, the Muslim Brotherhood boycotted a one million-man march called in Al Tahrir Square to push the military rulers to quicken the pace of change," I told my Western interlocutor, attempting to answer his question. "Despite the Brotherhood's absence, the march was impressive. The lesson that should have been learnt from this is that there are powers other than the Brotherhood, such as liberals and secularists, who can counterbalance the clout of the Brotherhood," I added. "Alas, unlike the Brotherhood, these powers do not have any staying power. They have failed to make sense of and prolong the positive impact of the May 27 protest, in order to make their influence strongly felt on the street." Over the past few weeks, there has been a major debate in Egypt over whether the legislative elections, due in September, ought to be postponed. Proponents of the delay fear that the Brotherhood would sweep these elections if they were held in September. For their part, the Brotherhood, heartened by the political gains they have made so far, insist that the vote should be held as planned, citing the relevant approval given by the majority of voters in a landmark referendum last March. "The problem with most political powers is that they are reluctant to make an effort to promote themselves among the Egyptians," I told the Western diplomat. "Like the Mubarak regime, they have made a bogeyman out of the Brotherhood and are now too afraid to behave self-confidently. The Brotherhood couldn't be luckier or happier."
