Egyptians have been clearly dismayed by the retrial of toppled president Hosni Mubarak and his release order recently issued by the Criminal Court after he spent two years in detention without receiving a final verdict. Though public prosecution ordered Mubarak to remain in custody on new corruption charges, the different revolutionary powers have a real sense of bitterness for the idea that charges against the former president in the case involving the murder the demonstrators during days of the revolution may be dropped. In this regard, senior judge Tareq el-Beshri explained that the judge made no fault by ordering the release of the sacked president because he was following the articles of criminal law in doing so. However, the problem is in having the former president's trial in front of a criminal court in the first place, rather than a revolutionary court. “Following the success of the revolution in toppling the Mubarak regime, the then political powers didn't have the courage to put Mubarak on revolutionary trial and question him about the crimes he had committed during his three-decades of rule. Instead they preferred referring him to a criminal court to punish him for the murder of around 1,000 protesters that were killed during the 18 days of the January 25 Revolution," el-Beshri stated to the press last week. Apparently, the evidence presented by the police and public prosecution to the court were not enough to convince the judge to issue a death sentence against Mubarak or his minister of the interior, Habib el-Adli, consequently, he was satisfied by giving them a life sentence in prison. The ruling was appealed by the defendants' lawyers to have the case re-seen by a new court that might lower the verdict or confirm it at the maximum. Some analysts started expressing concern over the possibility that the case might be ended with Mubarak cleared because of a lack of strong evidence that he gave orders to shoot at demonstrators during the 2011 uprising. In this concern, senior judge Hisham el-Bastawisi, a former presidential candidate, once said that to punish Mubarak for the crimes committed by the security men during the days of the revolution, the Egyptian parliament needs to endorse the International Criminal Court law under which presidents and other senior officials could be politically punished for crimes committed under their rule. That is why the senior Judge Ahmed Refaat couldn't issue a death sentence against Mubarak since there was no clear evidence proving that he gave instructions to shoot against the demonstrators. Instead Judge Refaat justified his ruling that Mubarak took no action to prevent further victims. On the other hand, calls for having a revolutionary court to try former officials of Mubarak's regime were hushed by some legislators who affirmed that in case of establishing such a court, its verdicts wouldn't be recognised by the international community. Their reason was that regaining money looted and tucked away in overseas banks by Mubarak and senior officials of the toppled regime would be impossible under verdict of a revolutionary court, rather than, ordinary courts. What deepens the problem and enhances a public sense of confusion is the fact that more victims continued to fall even after Mubarak's regime was toppled, during the transitional period while under the rule of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) and even after President Mohamed Morsi had been elected. Herein lies the crucial question: what is Mubarak being tried for if more martyrs continued to fall under the SCAF and Morsi's rule at the hands of the security men, the military police as well as MB supporters and members? If Mubarak is to be politically questioned for not providing protection for peaceful demonstrators from January 25 to February 11 of 2011, the SCAF also failed to offer same protection to the demonstrators of Maspero, in the Balloown theatre, Mohamed Mahmous Street, and at the Port Said soccer stadium. Most importantly is that President Morsi is politically responsible for the MB members' assault on peaceful demonstrators on November 2012 around the Presidential Palace, which caused 10 deaths. Thus many Egyptians have started showing sympathy for the 84-year-old Mubarak and clearly asking for his release and even to be cleared from any charges. Some anti-MB activists even say we should either release Mubarak or send Morsi as well and former SCAF heads to the same jail! Some revolutionaries called for mass demonstrations against the release of Mubarak, saying that it would symbolise the failure of their revolution. This could be true if the aim of the revolution was only to get rid of the former president rather than revolting against a totalitarian regime that caused clear injustice against Egyptian people for long decades. The real set back of the revolution is the failure to create a new democratic system that successfully works towards fulfilling the goals of the revolution: bread, dignity, freedom and social justice. Therefore, jailing or freeing Mubarak shouldn't be our utmost concern. Instead, we should concentrate on fulfilling justice and enforcing the rule of law on all people for the sake of preventing future injustices by any forthcoming rulers.
