tool of transformation, not just the big grammar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPNWM98Eko0
I suppose that apart from congratulating the people of Egypt and
wishing godspeed to that spirit of change spreading like a
democratizing Harmattan bushfire to the rest of the undemocratic
region, we have to help - to assist this will to change and to go for
a better life for those who are alive now and for the succeeding
generations.
Here's my two kobos worth:
On Feb 12, 1:40 am, toyin.fal...@mail.utexas.edu wrote:
> History Upends Icon of Stability in Egypt
> By MICHAEL SLACKMAN, New York, February 11, 2011
>
> Hosni Mubarak's legacy was supposed to be stability. During almost
> three decades in power, he rejected bold action in favor of caution.
> He took half-steps at economic liberalization, preserved the peace
> with Israel, gave his police force the power to arrest without charge
> and allowed only the veneer of democracy to take hold.
>
> But history upended Mr. Mubarak, and his fall came, as suddenly and
> surprisingly as his unlikely elevation to the presidency 30 years
> ago. Mr. Mubarak's Egypt rose up against him. The streets and squares
> filled with hundreds of thousands of protesters day and night until
> he could no longer deny the inescapable conclusion that in order to
> restore stability, he needed to go.
>
> It was an unexpected epitaph for a military man who until recently
> was revered - and reviled - as Egypt's modern-day pharaoh, serving
> longer than any contemporary Egyptian leader since Muhammad Ali, the
> founder of the modern state.
>
> "He's the accident of history who brilliantly survived as the longest
> accidental ruler of Egypt," said Emad Shahin, an Egyptian scholar at
> the University of Notre Dame who, like many other Egyptians living
> abroad, rushed to Tahrir Square in recent days to share in the moment.
>
> In his final appearance on state television on Thursday, when he
> astounded most of his listeners by appearing to say he would remain
> in office, he was no longer the stocky, confident military man who
> was the only leader most Egyptians had ever really known. At 82, he
> was frail and thin, with dyed black hair and a sometimes poignant
> undercurrent of self-justification.
>
> The Egyptian public, Egyptian political and military leaders, and
> American officials all expected him to say he was handing over power.
> But he apparently could not bring himself to say so, clinging to his
> vision of himself as a reluctant leader tapped by fate to lead a
> nation that could not survive without his guiding hand.
>
> With his authority already belittled by the crowds in the streets,
> with the people no longer silenced by the fear his security apparatus
> had enforced, his words served only to demonstrate how out of touch
> he had become.
>
> "I have given my life serving Egypt and the people," he said,
> suggesting it was he who was tired of them, and not the other way
> around.
>
> He failed this time using tactics that had so long sustained his
> rule: the ability to divide and conquer the masses, to anesthetize
> the population with promises, pay raises, subsidies and government
> reshuffling. He spoke of preserving his dignity, but that is exactly
> what the crowds in the street were fighting for, but for themselves.
>
> During his tenure, Egypt's population doubled to more than 80
> million. Life grew harder as the social contract between the state
> and citizens broke down. Satellite television and the Internet meant
> the state could no longer control what people knew, and so its
> narrative was often ignored or even mocked.
>
> The gap between rich and poor became greater, and politics became
> less ideological and more about common demands: for freedom,
> democracy, social justice, rule of law and economic equality.
>
> Mr. Mubarak's government struggled to prevent people's economic
> dissatisfaction from becoming political, but in the end, that failed
> too. As he feared, the Egyptian people blamed the entire system.
>
> But perhaps most of all, Mr. Mubarak's concept of stability - one
> that was embraced by Washington - in the end proved the ultimate
> destabilizer, experts in Egypt said. Facing a police state that
> choked off competing ideas and ideologies, preventing free elections
> and manipulating the state media, the public found the only way to
> achieve its goals was by taking to the streets, occupying the
> symbolic heart of the nation, Tahrir Square, and refusing to go home.
>
> Mr. Mubarak leaves office now with the country's future more
> uncertain than at any time since assassins killed President Anwar
> el-Sadat, elevating Mr. Mubarak to the presidency.
>
> "The idea of integration did not exist in Egypt under Mubarak," said
> Amr El-Shobaki, a political analyst at the state-financed Ahram
> Center for Political and Strategic Studies, in an interview before
> the crisis. "When they see the opposition, they only think, 'How do
> we eliminate them?' We have a lot of issues in society, political and
> social, and we don't have any legal body to express these demands or
> needs. This is our crisis."
>
> The people found a way, organized by social media and old-fashioned
> political mobilization, united by anger and hope.
>
> If stability was to be the hallmark of his reign, that very goal
> proved to be at least part of his undoing. Stability to many
> Egyptians came to mean stagnation, as the economy grew and so did the
> number of people living in poverty. Where once the rich, poor and
> middle class lived in the same neighborhoods, the wealthy later
> retreated to walled compounds of grass yards and swimming pools,
> while Mr. Mubarak's government struggled even to keep the streets
> clean of trash.
>
> Nearly every step he took in his quest to preserve the status quo
> ended up diminishing the standing of the nation as a whole - a blow
> to a nation that once saw itself as the center of civilization and
> the Arab world, many political analysts and social commentators said.
>
> Egyptians were shocked when their country did not receive even one
> vote to host the World Cup soccer tournament in 2000, and then were
> shocked again this year when Qatar, the tiny oil-and-gas rich Gulf
> nation, succeeded in winning the right to host the event in 2022.
>
> "He used the security forces, every political device, and 'crony
> capitalism' to realize his ends, sacrificing the dynamism, autonomy,
> and capabilities of Egyptians, particularly young people," said Diane
> Singerman, a professor at American University and an expert on
> contemporary Egypt.
>
> Mr. Mubarak was not always viewed through such a jaundiced lens. He
> was initially seen as the perfect antidote to what ailed his nation.
> Mr. Mubarak came to power in 1981, when Mr. Sadat was assassinated by
> Islamic radicals in the military. Mr. Mubarak, sitting next to him,
> was seared by the experience and from that moment on pledged to
> assure security.
>
> He came to power when Egypt was hugely in debt and unsure whether it
> could pay its bills. It was still ostracized by its Arab neighbors
> for making peace with Israel.
>
> Mr. Mubarak's role was to bring calm, stability and unity to his
> nation, and at first, he did. He was a taciturn military officer,
> offering a welcome contrast to his two predecessors, charismatic
> leaders who marked their place in history for bold if not always
> successful ideas. President Gamal Abdel Nasser promoted pan-Arabism,
> and Mr. Sadat made peace with Israel, a peace many Egyptians never
> fully accepted.
>
> "This guy came to power and he kept the country together," Abdel
> Moneim Said, the chairman of Al Ahram Newspaper and Publishing, said
> in an interview before the uprising. Mr. Mubarak also presented
> himself as a humble leader, tapped by fate to lead his nation. He was
> a former athlete, a squash player, a former military man and
> commander of the air force who, analysts and peers said, believed
> that long hours and hard work were equal to good leadership.
>
> He publicly rejected nepotism, though in later years would maneuver
> to have his son succeed him. He publicly shunned corruption, although
> Egyptians became convinced that the powerful enriched themselves at
> the public's expense.
>
> His early successes were substantial, especially in the realm of
> foreign policy. He helped to bring Egypt back into the Arab fold, but
> also managed to serve as a strong voice for peace between Arab
> nations and Israel. In the mid-1990s, he was instrumental in helping
> to forge the agreements with Israel and the P.L.O. that were intended
> to foster a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.
>
> Mr. Mubarak oversaw substantial improvements in Egypt's
> infrastructure and helped, initially, to reschedule debt and
> stabilize the economy. He was also a friend of Washington, which gave
> annual military and economic aid of as much as $2 billion. In 1991,
> he helped to organize the coalition of Arab armies that agreed to
> join the United States in the first Persian Gulf war to push Saddam
> Hussein out of Kuwait.
>
> Even during the years when Mr. Mubarak was unhappy with President
> George W. Bush for talking about human rights and democracy in Egypt,
> he was seen as an ally willing to help with many issues, including
> the effort to thwart Iran's growing regional influence and to try to
> contain the militant group Hamas, which had seized control of the
> Gaza Strip. Egypt was a partner in implementing the widely criticized
> policy of rendition, in which terrorism suspects were flown to third
> countries for harsh interrogation, even torture.
>
> "He kept close to the United States, but independent of it," said Mr.
> Said, who was a member of Mr. Mubarak's ruling National Democratic
> Party. On the day before the seminal Jan. 25 protest that ultimately
> pushed Mr. Mubarak out of office, Mr. Said said that he thought such
> an outcome was out of the question.
>
> But Mr. Mubarak's approach never seemed to change with the times,
> experts said, and he ultimately became viewed as an isolated
> autocrat, who allowed, or promoted, corruption and cronyism. He
> preserved an emergency law that allowed the police to arrest without
> cause, restricted the right to assembly, and set up a military court.
>
> The public anger grew, visible to many - but not to the president or
> his circle.
>
> "The government does what it wants and they think nobody can do
> anything about it," said Fahmy Howeidy, a social commentator,
> speaking before the uprising began. "But there is a difference
> between people swallowing this and the anger accumulating in the
> people. Civil society institutions are in a state of collapse and are
> extremely weakened. But the people are there and they are angry."
>
> His political organization, the ruling National Democratic Party, was
> less a party than a collection of interests. It grew widely despised,
> and during the recent tumult in the street the protesters set its
> headquarters on fire.
>
> "If he left in 1993, he would have been a great president for sure,"
> said Mr. Shobaki of the Ahram Center. "If he left in the '90s, it's
> average. And starting 2000, we start the real decline."
>
> Mr. Mubarak appointed a cabinet to implement economic improvements,
> and made some cosmetic political changes. The first three times he
> ran for re-election, he ran unopposed, in what were called
> referendums. The fourth time, he allowed opposition candidates, but
> won with millions of votes and suspicions of electoral manipulation.
> The nearest challenger, Ayman Nour, got about 600,000 votes, and was
> later jailed on what were widely seen as politically motivated
> charges.
>
> During his three decades in power, Mr. Mubarak, his allies and his
> party never managed to define an idea for Egyptians to believe in.
> "The excesses of free markets without freedoms, the increased
> economic inequality in Egypt and crass inattention and suspicion of
> the needs and aspirations of the majority of Egyptians, finally rose
> up to pierce the monarchical, securitized state that he and his
> supporters had built," said Mrs. Singerman, the American University
> professor.
>
> During his tenure, Egyptians never lost their well-known sense of
> humor and their zest for satire. And it was not long after he took
> office that his hallmark, stability, was already mocked not as a
> legacy, but as a punch line.
>
> The joke from the late 1980s went like this: Mr. Mubarak's driver
> came to a fork in the road. He asked his driver which way President
> Nasser went and the response was, "Always left." He asked about
> President Sadat and the answer was, "Always right."
>
> "Signal left, then right, and park," Mr. Mubarak told his driver.
--
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