Mohamed, my friend and ex-Muslim Brotherhood member, left Cairo two weeks ago for his hometown Damietta. He is going to be there for a month and a half, and he hopes to come back to Cairo in the beginning of November as a newly-elected member of the Egyptian Parliament. If his party, the “Egyptian Movement” (it makes sense in Arabic), wins 60% of the votes in his electoral district, Mohamed will win a spot in the first Egyptian Parliament in the post-Mubarak era.
Before he left, I had a chance to sit down with Mohamed for an extended chat about his political ambitions and platform at one of Cairo’s many cafes nestled in a downtown alley. Before discussing his election campaign, Mohamed first laid out the basics of the electoral system in Damietta. As he described it, his party is competing primarily with a party composed of former Mubarak supporters (known in Arabic “falul” – the remnants). The residents of Damietta will be voting on two separate ballots: one is a party-list system, in which voters vote for a specific party which is then allocated a number of seats in Parliament proportional to the percentage of votes it receives. The other is for independent candidates, running without a party affiliation, whom the voters choose based on their individual merits. Mohamed is running on a party-list, and he is ranked fifth out of eight candidates on the Egyptian Movement’s party list (Damietta will have eight party-list seats, so if a party won 50% of the votes, for example, its top four candidates would earn seats in Parliament). If you find this system unnecessarily confusing, you are not alone – there has been a lot of griping over the past few months about the complexity of the electoral system and its vulnerability to fraud.
Mohamed began describing his platform with a simple statement: “I am running in order represent the interests of Damietta’s youth.” Before diving into his views on specific political or economic issues, Mohamed detailed his plan to revamp Damietta’s educational system, which he considers one of his core issues. Arising from the belief that the education system fundamentally sells Egypt’s youth short and inculcates them with useless information through its emphasis on rote memorization, Mohamed wants Damietta’s youth to take matters into their own hands. He plans to identify 300 of the brightest students in the area (“for their critical thinking skills, not their ability to score well on Egypt’s secondary school exit exam”) and provide them with six month scholarships to study education in Brazil or Malaysia. After learning about those countries’ educational systems, they would then return to Damietta and begin working in local schools as teaching assistants and administration advisers in an attempt to change the curriculum to better serve the students’ needs. At the same time, Mohamed wants to open a new high school for exceptionally smart students (50 per year) that would be modeled after the American educational system (read: critical thinking skills, hands-on learning, liberal-arts style breadth and depth).
In addition to his proposal for education reform, Mohamed also has a distinct economic philosophy that he describes as “socialist and centered around the needs of the poor.” Damietta is a large manufacturing center, and Mohamed commented that the many factory workers are all inclined to vote for candidates with socialist economic policies. He is calling for the Egyptian government to play a significant role in supporting certain industries with tax breaks and investment subsidies, while identifying others that it deems less essential and will thus tax stiffly. “How can Egypt export grain,” Mohamed queried, “when we have to import other food from abroad in order to feed our own people?”
On top of emphasizing domestic production and imposing stiffer government oversight on Egypt’s exports and imports, Mohamed plans to focus on ensuring that all of Egypt’s workers have a minimum wage of 50,000 Egyptian pounds (approximately $8,500) per year. Given that Egypt’s current GDP per capita is just under $3,000, that goal seems nearly impossible to reach in the near future. Suffice it to say that Mohamed’s economic plan, were it actually implemented, would represent a major shift away from the Mubarak regime’s efforts to promote liberal economic reform.
As to foreign policy, Mohamed declared that Egypt should emulate the Turkish “zero problems with neighbors” model. In his own words, Mohamed emphasized his belief that “dignity” should be a core concept of Egypt’s foreign policy: “If other countries respect us, we will certainly respect them.” Beyond the rhetoric, however, he did not go into many specifics. When I asked him about his position on Egypt’s relationship with Israel, he replied that he did not inherently oppose the idea of Israel as a Jewish state nor was he opposed to the idea of Egypt and Israel continuing their economic and diplomatic relations. He did say, however, that “as long as Israel continues to kill our soldiers [on the Sinai border] and Palestinian children, we cannot accept it as a legitimate partner.”
Taken as a whole, what is there to make of Mohamed’s policy positions? In my opinion, his platform as a whole seems high on rhetoric and low on substance. He is enthusiastic and full of ideas, but none of them seem to be grounded in a sober analysis of the political and economic realities in Egypt. Can the Egyptian government actually pay for any of the social programs he proposes? Would it be able to carry out a major realignment of the tax system? Will the Parliament be able to wrest any control over the country’s foreign policy away from the military? Mohamed, like many other candidates for Parliament, does not have any political experience. While he and his fellow Egyptians are bursting with enthusiasm at the prospect of what they hope will be the country’s first set of transparent democratic elections, no one is quite sure how that enthusiasm will translate into the reality of writing, passing, and implementing legislation.
In addition to that uncertainty, the elephant in the political room is, of course, the military. It remains as powerful as ever, and, as of yet, has not laid out a firm timetable for completing the transfer of power to a civilian government. In the battle for power between a Parliament filled with green politicians and a military council composed of experienced soldiers who have access to extensive financial resources and support from the behemoth that is Egypt’s security apparatus, it is hard to imagine that Mohamed or any of his peers will have much success carrying out their plans without the military’s approval.
For now, however, Mohamed has the luxury of ignoring the rocky road ahead. He left his job as a sales representative at a medical services company to focus on his election campaign. From now until election time, he will be doing what politicians do when they campaign: attending public events, meeting with voters, spreading his message as widely as possible. After we had finished our last cups of tea, I wished him good luck: “rabina yuafuqk!” – May God grant you success.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Egypt's Treason Law: Using Mubarak-era Tactics to Keep Mubarak's Cronies Out
Earlier this summer, I wrote an article for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy's "Fikra Forum" about the ongoing economic debate in Egypt. Today, I just published my second piece on the site. This article is about Egypt's newly-amended "Treason Law," which is aimed at keeping Hosni Mubarak's former cronies in the now-defunct National Democratic Party out of Egypt's future political scene. As you will see in my article, however, this law has the potential to backfire and open the door to a new era of dictatorship in Egypt. You can find it here on Fikra Forum.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
A Firsthand Look at the Muslim Brotherhood
Since the ouster of Hosni Mubarak, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has emerged as a legitimate political force that is sure to play a large role in shaping Egypt’s future. Both Egyptian and Western media organizations have devoted a large amount of focus to analyzing the MB’s political prospects, its power structure, and its position in Egyptian society. While most Egyptians have plenty of opportunities to form their own opinions about the MB from their own interactions with members and the Egyptian media’s coverage of the subject, the only exposure to the MB that many non-Egyptians have is through the Western media. Those articles and news reports have alternately described the MB as a widely popular, democratizing force, or terrorist sympathizers bent on war with Israel and ensuring that Egypt becomes another case of “one man, one vote, one time.”
While I do not consider myself an expert on the MB, I want to share with the readers of this blog some of my experiences with the Brotherhood throughout the past few months in Cairo. Before this year, I had not had the opportunity to meet any Brotherhood members. Open membership in the MB during the Mubarak era could easily lead to expulsion from college or the loss of a job. This year, however, everything has changed. Membership in the Brotherhood no longer puts one at risk of intimidation or state-sponsored violence. As a result, I have had the opportunity to meet and befriend an MB member, and I think that his story is quite instructive for anyone wanting to learn more about the role that the MB plays in Egyptian politics and society.
The story begins with a discussion group that I attend every Thursday afternoon at a Cairo think tank. A group of Egyptian political activists and interested citizens from all sides of the political spectrum come together to discuss a specific political issue with an expert in the field – past meetings have focused on the relationship between religion and the state, the continued sit-ins in Tahrir Square, and analyzing the recently released electoral laws. I generally do much more listening than talking at these meetings (I consider it an achievement that I am merely able to understand much of what is being discussed…), and I consider each meeting one of the highlights of my week.
My friend Mohamed, a 27 year-old man who works at a pharmaceutical company, is the leader and organizer of the group. Until this past March, Mohamed was a member of the MB, but he and several hundred other young members formally split from the Brotherhood a few months ago. Mohamed had been a part of the Brotherhood for 12 years. While we had discussed politics and international relations several times previously, I did not learn Mohamed’s personal story until my last week in Cairo this summer. After we finished our weekly meeting, he asked me if I would come with him to a local café and serve as a translator for an interview that a Czech researcher had scheduled with him. The interview lasted an hour and a half, and, in addition to learning firsthand how tough it is to serve as a translator, I was fascinated by Mohamed’s story.
Mohamed grew up in a town in the Nile Delta near the Mediterranean coast, the son of a politically indifferent mother and a socialist father. At age 15, he decided to join the Muslim Brotherhood. He respected the local Brotherhood members and believed that there was a natural synthesis between the Islamic principles that the Brotherhood espoused and the establishment of a just, transparent government in Egypt (i.e. the opposite of the Mubarak regime). While Mohamed’s father was initially opposed to his participation in the MB, Mohamed recalled that his father’s opposition softened over time as he saw that Mohamed’s participation in the MB seemed to make him a more focused student and well-rounded person.
Mohamed climbed the ranks of the Brotherhood, and he continued to play a role in it throughout college and after graduation. He eventually reached the fifth and highest level of Brotherhood membership (although if he had stayed on he would have had a ways to go before obtaining a provincial or national leadership position). He participated in the January revolution that toppled Mubarak, but in the wake of Mubarak’s resignation Mohamed found himself caught in the divide that has currently split the MB in two.
In a meeting on March 26 with several hundred members of the Brotherhood’s younger generation, Mohamed and his colleagues declared that they were officially cutting ties with the MB. As Mohamed was careful to point out, he did not split off from the MB because he disagreed with the group’s political or religious principles. Instead, he fundamentally disagreed with what he saw as the MB’s mixing of preaching and politics as it sought to garner political support leading up to the first elections in the post-Mubarak Egypt. While Mohamed himself had taken part in both fields (preaching and politics), he steadfastly maintained that two must remain separate. The MB devotes a great deal of effort to maintaining a presence at local mosques and spreading its version of Islamic values to the attendees therein. In Mohamed’s opinion, however, the MB’s preaching had begun to cross over into the political realm. As he explained to me in one of our earlier conversations, bringing politics into the mosque has the potential to sow division and detract from the Brotherhood’s political and religious goals. “Politics is a matter of choice,” he said, “you pick the person or the party that you think best represents you. Disagreement is normal. The problem with mixing preaching and politics is that if someone disagrees with your politics, that disagreement can carry over to religion, too. Our opponents will then seem to be arguing not only against our politics, but also against religion as a whole. If that happened, it would sully both our name and Islam as a whole.”
That was Mohamed’s official reason for leaving the Brotherhood, and I have no reason to doubt his sincerity. At the same time, however, he and his fellow youth defectors did not disavow the Brotherhood’s ideology. He joined a new party called the “Renaissance Party,” which he described as embracing almost all of the Brotherhood’s values without mixing preaching and politics. He also supports former Brotherhood leader and current presidential candidate Abd-Munam Abu-al-Futuh (who was expelled from the Brotherhood upon declaring his intention to stand in the presidential elections – the MB is not fielding an official candidate for this year’s presidential elections). Mohamed’s continued adherence to Islamist political platforms suggests that there is another factor that contributed to his decision: the split between the older and younger generations of the MB.
While people often think of the Brotherhood as a monolithic institution devoid of any differentiating views on politics or religion, it has become quite clear since the January 25 revolution that the Brotherhood is actually quite diverse. The Brotherhood’s leadership is largely composed of the old guard members whose political views have been hardened by years of repression under the Nasser, Sadat, and Mubarak regimes. The younger generation, however, has shown itself much more amenable to cooperation with non-Islamist groups. Furthermore, the younger generation has publicly chafed against the old guard’s hesitance to turn over leadership positions to them. This split in the Brotherhood continues to grow, and, with defections such as those of Mohamed and his colleagues and the rise of more hardline groups such as the Salafis, the MB no longer has a monopoly on Islamist politics in Egypt.
While I do not consider myself an expert on the MB, I want to share with the readers of this blog some of my experiences with the Brotherhood throughout the past few months in Cairo. Before this year, I had not had the opportunity to meet any Brotherhood members. Open membership in the MB during the Mubarak era could easily lead to expulsion from college or the loss of a job. This year, however, everything has changed. Membership in the Brotherhood no longer puts one at risk of intimidation or state-sponsored violence. As a result, I have had the opportunity to meet and befriend an MB member, and I think that his story is quite instructive for anyone wanting to learn more about the role that the MB plays in Egyptian politics and society.
The story begins with a discussion group that I attend every Thursday afternoon at a Cairo think tank. A group of Egyptian political activists and interested citizens from all sides of the political spectrum come together to discuss a specific political issue with an expert in the field – past meetings have focused on the relationship between religion and the state, the continued sit-ins in Tahrir Square, and analyzing the recently released electoral laws. I generally do much more listening than talking at these meetings (I consider it an achievement that I am merely able to understand much of what is being discussed…), and I consider each meeting one of the highlights of my week.
My friend Mohamed, a 27 year-old man who works at a pharmaceutical company, is the leader and organizer of the group. Until this past March, Mohamed was a member of the MB, but he and several hundred other young members formally split from the Brotherhood a few months ago. Mohamed had been a part of the Brotherhood for 12 years. While we had discussed politics and international relations several times previously, I did not learn Mohamed’s personal story until my last week in Cairo this summer. After we finished our weekly meeting, he asked me if I would come with him to a local café and serve as a translator for an interview that a Czech researcher had scheduled with him. The interview lasted an hour and a half, and, in addition to learning firsthand how tough it is to serve as a translator, I was fascinated by Mohamed’s story.
Mohamed grew up in a town in the Nile Delta near the Mediterranean coast, the son of a politically indifferent mother and a socialist father. At age 15, he decided to join the Muslim Brotherhood. He respected the local Brotherhood members and believed that there was a natural synthesis between the Islamic principles that the Brotherhood espoused and the establishment of a just, transparent government in Egypt (i.e. the opposite of the Mubarak regime). While Mohamed’s father was initially opposed to his participation in the MB, Mohamed recalled that his father’s opposition softened over time as he saw that Mohamed’s participation in the MB seemed to make him a more focused student and well-rounded person.
Mohamed climbed the ranks of the Brotherhood, and he continued to play a role in it throughout college and after graduation. He eventually reached the fifth and highest level of Brotherhood membership (although if he had stayed on he would have had a ways to go before obtaining a provincial or national leadership position). He participated in the January revolution that toppled Mubarak, but in the wake of Mubarak’s resignation Mohamed found himself caught in the divide that has currently split the MB in two.
In a meeting on March 26 with several hundred members of the Brotherhood’s younger generation, Mohamed and his colleagues declared that they were officially cutting ties with the MB. As Mohamed was careful to point out, he did not split off from the MB because he disagreed with the group’s political or religious principles. Instead, he fundamentally disagreed with what he saw as the MB’s mixing of preaching and politics as it sought to garner political support leading up to the first elections in the post-Mubarak Egypt. While Mohamed himself had taken part in both fields (preaching and politics), he steadfastly maintained that two must remain separate. The MB devotes a great deal of effort to maintaining a presence at local mosques and spreading its version of Islamic values to the attendees therein. In Mohamed’s opinion, however, the MB’s preaching had begun to cross over into the political realm. As he explained to me in one of our earlier conversations, bringing politics into the mosque has the potential to sow division and detract from the Brotherhood’s political and religious goals. “Politics is a matter of choice,” he said, “you pick the person or the party that you think best represents you. Disagreement is normal. The problem with mixing preaching and politics is that if someone disagrees with your politics, that disagreement can carry over to religion, too. Our opponents will then seem to be arguing not only against our politics, but also against religion as a whole. If that happened, it would sully both our name and Islam as a whole.”
That was Mohamed’s official reason for leaving the Brotherhood, and I have no reason to doubt his sincerity. At the same time, however, he and his fellow youth defectors did not disavow the Brotherhood’s ideology. He joined a new party called the “Renaissance Party,” which he described as embracing almost all of the Brotherhood’s values without mixing preaching and politics. He also supports former Brotherhood leader and current presidential candidate Abd-Munam Abu-al-Futuh (who was expelled from the Brotherhood upon declaring his intention to stand in the presidential elections – the MB is not fielding an official candidate for this year’s presidential elections). Mohamed’s continued adherence to Islamist political platforms suggests that there is another factor that contributed to his decision: the split between the older and younger generations of the MB.
While people often think of the Brotherhood as a monolithic institution devoid of any differentiating views on politics or religion, it has become quite clear since the January 25 revolution that the Brotherhood is actually quite diverse. The Brotherhood’s leadership is largely composed of the old guard members whose political views have been hardened by years of repression under the Nasser, Sadat, and Mubarak regimes. The younger generation, however, has shown itself much more amenable to cooperation with non-Islamist groups. Furthermore, the younger generation has publicly chafed against the old guard’s hesitance to turn over leadership positions to them. This split in the Brotherhood continues to grow, and, with defections such as those of Mohamed and his colleagues and the rise of more hardline groups such as the Salafis, the MB no longer has a monopoly on Islamist politics in Egypt.
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