In the days since a rapturous crowd of thousands greeted Mohamed ElBaradei's homecoming to Cairo, the former UN nuclear agency chief has electrified Egypt's normally moribund opposition. The Nobel Peace Prize laureate could have retired to France, where he has a house, after stepping down from his job as the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) last year. Instead, he responded to opposition figures' calls for him to run for president in the 2011 elections with a series of withering critiques of the government he once represented as a diplomat. Officially, he is banned under Egpyt's constitution from running for president - but he has kept up the pressure in the days since a massive crowd greeted him at the airport last week, calling on him to run. Leading opposition figures met at his house on Tuesday night and agreed to form a "Coalition for Change," aimed at reforming Egypt's constitution. The meeting followed a series of high-profile interviews. "Ninety-nine per-cent of Egyptians want change," he told the popular television talk show al-Ashira Masaan Sunday, his first televised interview since his return Friday. "The poor and the rich, the young and the old - they all believe that change is necessary and urgent and imperative." Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak arranged a VIP reception for him last Friday. "People from all walks of life were there: young people, women wearing the niqab, the hijab, or not veiled at all; intellectuals; peasants; people of all ages and classes," he said. Most, he said, were young people "looking for hope. And they found in me a symbol for a better future." "ElBaradei has become the symbol of the hope for change for millions of Egyptians," novelist Alaa al-Aswani said in al-Shorouq Tuesday. "The crowds and I trust he will not let them down." ElBaradei himself has said he does not want to be seen as a saviour. "Because there is no democracy, people don't understand what it is. They are looking at one person to bring democracy to the country," he told Dream TV. Democracy in Egypt, he said, "means moving from a Pharaonic regime that has been in the country for the past 7,000 years, to ruling through institutions and good governance." Neither the government nor the opposition has so far been quite sure what to do with him. Osama Saraya, editor of the semi-official Al-Ahram newspaper, has accused ElBaradei of being "ill-informed" and "an American stooge." "What does El-Baradei know about Egypt?" asked Minister of State for Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Moufid Shehab. "He has been living abroad for years ... He knows nothing about the problems of Egypt." Columnist Mohamed al-Saadani took up that theme in Al-Ahram on Monday. "(ElBaradei's) rosy dreams will fade when he discovers that none of those searching for a loaf of bread even knows his name." Egypt's largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, seemed to agree. The Muslim Brotherhood has announced it would not support him. "Those who support ElBaradei are an elitist bloc with no roots in the Egyptian street," senior Brotherhood leader Mohamed Habib wrote in the independent newspaper Al-Masry Al-Youm. "It is true that ElBaradei was successful in his international mission, and that he is a clean man who was not tainted by corruption, but the internal politics of Egypt are another matter entirely," Habib said. ElBaradei cannot run for president. Amendments to the constitution passed in 2007 prohibit him from doing so because he has not held a senior position in a legal political party for a year. "I am not nominating myself (for president)," he told Dream TV. "I am talking about the fate of a nation, and the future of our sons. I am saying we have a problem. We must change course. Whether I am part of that change or just light the way is secondary."
