Fake Democracy: Egypt after the Election

[Greater China]

Fake Democracy: Egypt after the Election

by Manlio Dinucci |4 July 2012

All eyes are riveted on Egypt, international showcase of the "Arab" Spring regime change operations. The enthusiasm with which the Western media have been promoting the Egyptian "revolution" is enough to raise serious doubts as to its true nature. In reality, the Empire believed that the Arabs were ripe for the establishment of the most effective social control mechanism under the sun: an alternating two-party system.

The first to congratulate the new Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi was President Obama. He gave him a friendly call, vowing that the United States "will continue to support Egypt’s transition to democracy" and intends to "promote their common interests on the basis of mutual respect." The White House announced that the two presidents pledged to "develop USA-Egypt partnerships, staying in close contact in the coming months."

Is the United States turning its back on the military caste, the mainstay for over thirty years of its influence in Egypt, to embrace the Muslim Brotherhood organization, considered as hostile up to now? Oh no!

Immediately after Morsi, Obama called General Ahmed Shafik, the military presidential candidate, encouraging him to pursue his political commitment to "promote the democratic process." A commitment that the military showed by dissolving the Parliament. Thanks to Washington’s vital support, military assistance to Egypt, said the State Department, constitutes "an important pillar of bilateral relations."

Egypt receives annually from the U.S. a military aid of about $ 1.5 billion. She also enjoys a privilege reserved for very few countries: the funds are deposited into an account at the Federal Reserve Bank in New York, where they generate significant interest. This increases the purchasing power of the Egyptian armed forces, whose shopping list at the U.S. military market includes: M1A1 Abrams tanks (co-manufactured in Egypt), F-16 fighters, Apache helicopters and other military equipment. In addition, the Pentagon sends them its surplus weapons, for an annual value of one hundred million dollars. In exchange the U.S. armed forces are given free access to Egypt, which hosts every two years the Bright Star military exercise, the largest in the region.

Equally generous is Washington’s "economic aid." Egypt is in crisis: the public deficit rose to $ 25 billion and foreign debt to 34, while the reserves of foreign exchange are down from 36 billion in 2011 to 15 in 2012. So here we have the U.S. extending its hand of friendship. The Obama administration has allocated $ 2 billion for the promotion of U.S. private investments in the region, primarily in Egypt. Other U.S. investments will be made, facilitated by Cairo in exchange for the relief of one billion dollars in foreign debt. Egypt will also receive a credit of one billion dollars, guaranteed by the U.S., in order to regain "access to capital markets." And thanks again to the USA, the International Monetary Fund is prepared to provide Egypt with a line of credit. At the same time, the U.S. embassy in Cairo is launching new programs to help young Egyptian entrepreneurs to kick-start or develop their own activities.

Consequently, all of Washington’s card are on the table: economic, to strangle Egypt and groom an pro-U.S. managerial class; political, to give the country a sheen of civilian democratic rule that will not jeopardize the influence of the U.S. in the country, and military, to bet on a coup d’état if the other cards fail.

But one hitch remains: a Gallup poll indicates that, in ten months, the Egyptians opposed to U.S. aid increased from 52% to 82%.

VoltaireNet

 

[Greater China]

Egypt: Interpreting the Coup

by Zeinab Abul-Magd | July 3, 2012

There is a consensus in Egypt now that we live under military rule. Most observers believe the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) executed a military coup over the last two weeks through legal measures, and describe it as a 'soft’ coup that hardly relied on tanks and guns.

In February 2011 [see timeline], while the slogan of "The army and the people are one hand" was coined and disseminated, the SCAF established full control over the essential institutions of the state. The main pillars of a successful coup were all there: control over media, the bureaucracy, the security apparatus and the legal system.

However, the Egyptian coup seems hard to interpret. The intricate election of Morsy as a civilian president who does not belong to the coup plotters came as a surprise to many. As opposed to old-fashioned coups of the Cold War era, when the leaders of coups installed themselves as autocrats for life, the Egyptian coup allowed a civilian contestant to triumph over a fellow military candidate from the presidential race and assume power.

Elected Son of the Coup

Morsy is an elected son of the coup. He is the civilian president that the military council allowed to rise to power, but only after issuing a supplement to the Constitutional Declaration that deprives him of any substantial authority over the armed forces. Morsy will inherit a highly militarized state where retired army generals and colonels occupy almost every high-ranking position in the bureaucracy and the public sector. This is in addition to the fact that the military runs massive economic enterprises.

Despite the fact that the militarization of the state is a huge hurdle to any civilian president who aspires for real reform, it is significant that Morsy began his first speech by expressing his deep love for the military institution. Morsy showed no intentions during his campaign to demilitarize the state.

The U.S. had a big role to play in pressuring the military to honor Morsy's win. A report published by Al-Watan daily newspaper said U.S. officials met with SCAF members to press the latter to announce the valid results of the election and accept Morsy's victory. Before that, and over the course of many months or even years, the U.S. had numerous talks with Muslim Brotherhood leaders in Cairo and Washington, where the Brothers always emphasized their choice of market economy policies as well as their adherence to international agreements.

Even though Egypt has elected its first civilian president since its independence, it remains a bittersweet victory. This is not only because there is a public mistrust of the Muslim Brotherhood, but, more importantly, because Morsy's presidency is characteristic of a new generation of military coups. The SCAF celebrates free elections only to be allowed to tighten its grip on power while securing its indispensable American funding.

uruknet.info