Sly Circumvention of Peoples Will in Egypt

The land of Egypt has been the citadel of Pharaohs right from the times of Prophet Musa (or Moses, peace of Allah be to him) as far as governance is concerned. Even the modern history of the land as well as the River Nile bears witness that the things over there have not changed since King Farouk was deposed in a ‘bloodless’ coup 60 years ago. And Gamal Abdul Nasser, Anwar Sadat and Hosni Mubarak played their respective Pharaonical roles ever since. The February 2011 revolution gave the hope that the chain of 60-year long despotic rule would now break and the brave people of Egypt take a sigh of relief, peace and progress. But this does not seem to happen as the decisions being taken, one after another, by Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC) and Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) have shattered the long-cherished hopes and aspirations of the Egyptians, and put a spanner in the ongoing democratic process in the country.

One SCC ruling of far-reaching implications is the dissolution of elected parliament, ban on elected representatives to enter the august house, and thereby throwing all the powers of legislation and drafting of constitution on the shoulders of SCAF. Another such diabolical decision is seizure of powers of the president and bringing the person in Egypt’s highest office under the supreme command of SCAF.

The result of the presidential election run-off was scheduled to be officially announced on June 21 but it was delayed, and as we are to rush to the press it is yet to be announced (at 3 p.m. on June 24). Both the candidates of the run-off have claimed victory but the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) candidate Mohamed Morsi’s campaign coordinator, Dr. Ahmed Abdel-Aati on June 19 announced that his office had the final results collected separately from each of Egypt’s 27 provinces to show that Mr. Morsi won 52% of votes while his rival Gen. Ahmad Shafiq 48%.

One important point here is that the FJP has submitted 134 electoral complaints to Presidential Election Committee, alleging vote-rigging multi-ballot registry papers and illegal voting by certain factions such as army recruits and police and army officers.

All this is nothing less than a military coup, a rape of democracy, continuation of military dictatorship. This assault on and sly circumvention of people’s will is taking place in Egypt with the world, especially the west’s champions of democracy, watching the scenario with their lips tied or perhaps with wild and veiled glee.