BEFORE the January 25 Revolution, the Egyptians used to lead a sedentary political life style by taking an audience seat, leaving the stage to the ruling party to take the leading role in a one-man show, the opposition parties playing extras without real influence on the scene. Today, most Egyptians have decided to abandon their couch and have leapt onto the stage to force out the sole actor for his boring performance that brought depression and sadness to their life. Even those who did not possess the vitality to take such a high leap and continued sticking to their seats enthusiastically followed the ongoing changes on the stage in the hope of eventually enjoying better living conditions and increased development. Under the rule of Mubarak, one could spend a week without reading the newspapers or watching the news on TV without having many events passing without their knowledge. However, today, many people keep their TV sets on around the clock to keep up with speedily happening events, especially with the latest developments in the streets following the November 22 decree. This decree granted the President wide-ranging powers, and gave unprecedented immunity to all his decisions against the opposition or their cancellation, even by the Constitutional Court. However, despite his annulling his controversial decree, the street has continued to boil with anger, because of the president's insistence on putting the Islamist-written constitution to a referendum just 15 days after its completion by the Constituent Assembly. The opposition, in form of the new political parties, the youth movements, as well as ordinary citizens, who adopt the vision of creating a civil democratic state and not a religious one, have occupied the stage and refused to play the role of extras in the ongoing theatre. Actually, those parties accepted the presidential elections results, which brought onto the scene members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) although they cannot be regarded as real contributor to the revolution. The problem is that the MB has lost balance, the group seeing itself as taking a leading role in the new scenario, committing the same mistake as playing the one-man show by attempting to silence the opposition forces or at least force them to play the roles of the extras. This is what one could clearly understand from the words of the President in the interview he gave to the official state TV, when he expressed his happiness at seeing these wide demonstrations the people organised following his decree that set the basis for a new dictatorship rule. The President considered these protests as a sound reflection of freedom of expression without consider recanting his decree to gain public support and agreement over the new constitution. It is only when the peaceful demonstrations became violent at the hands of the MB followers, that the President was forced to resort to a national dialogue with the opposition to resolve the dilemma. In the absence of real opposition figures, he decided to annul November 22 decree and issue a new one. This later one omitted the controversial articles that offered Morsi absolute authority over the judiciary and ability to follow exceptional procedures whenever he sees fit, which the activists saw as a kind of threat to re-call the state of emergency that Egypt suffered living under for decades. The problem is that President Morsi has not got the message yet and continues manoeuvring to have his decisions passed by insistence on putting the draft constitution to a referendum despite the fierce opposition the different political powers are showing to it. In other words, the MB, as represented in the presidency, believe that they can turn the clock back to the date of January 24, 2011 date and force the nation back into their traditional audience seat instead of accepting them as influential partners or supporting actors in the ongoing drama. Another problem is that the MB seems very confident of the result of the referendum, depending on the silent extras, represented in the ordinary poor uneducated people, who have accustomed to being taken to the ballot boxes to say ‘yes' to the constitution whose components they know nothing about. The tools are many and simple, starting with the religious propagation to financial incentive. They might succeed in their plan and so have the constitution accepted, but this does not mean the end of the play or the start of forcing the MB's Islamic project onto Egyptian society. The reason is that the Egyptians have decided not to return to their previous sedentary position, which proved harmful to their life and that of their offspring. Therefore, we might wake up one day to discover a change of roles and positions on the stage with those, who meant to dominate the scene and play the solo hero role, forced to step down the stage by the supporting actors and actresses to become extras. Hopefully, it will not take Egypt long to have all parties realise that the most influential successful play is that performed by a group of excellent professional actors in real harmony.
