Tuesday 1 February 2011

Egypt first hand

Got back from Egypt last night. Low level protests in Luxor and Aswan much of last week. The much hated Egyptian police were getting a pasting from the stone throwing lads. Most entertaining. The level of protest and popular engagement in Upper Egypt, however, was disappointing and not at all as seen in Cairo, Alex and Suez and looked pale in comparison with, for example, the recent student protests in London. This is perhaps due to the lack of any consistent leadership of opposition and uncertainty about who and "what" may take over post-Mubarak. El Baradai, for example, didn't seem to raise much interest from the locals, who sometimes referred to him as "an American". Nonetheless, I didn't hear one person say anything nice about Mubarak and his cronies either. There will be significant tension between the educated middle class, who want to see Egypt follow Turkey into a West-facing economy (accepting that Turkey may actually be changing to be more significantly Orient-ated) and the fellahin, who are more interested in a moderate Islamist solution, led by the Muslim Bortherhood. Neither position is actually supported by anything resembling "a plan", suggesting a significant ideological/power vacuum may form, which would be deeply destabilising for the country. We must remain optimistic that someone from outside the current political establishment will seize the initiative and set out a constructive plan for transition or else, I'm sorry to say, things are going to get alot worse before they get better. Good riddance to Mubarak though - a fantastic opportunity for the Egyptians to democratically determine their own future though, rather than have the military-industrial complex dictate it for them.

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