Egypt: The fire of revolution Wednesday, 16 February 2011 01:13

Finally, Mubarak surrendered and announced his stepping down. After a long period of bargaining, procrastinating, and repeating the famous saying of his deputy after each speech: “the riots are over, go back to your homes!”  All of this indicates that Mubarak and his regime did not realize the intensity of the revolution or the depth of its sincerity, and failed to listen to the voices of the millions.

Unfortunately, Mubarak and his regime think that there is a foreign agenda influencing the people, and wonder how people who were once so passive and obedient could possibly transform overnight. Sadly, they underestimated the chanting of the youthful demonstrators and regarded them as phonies planted through bribery. They did not give their hearts a chance to see that everyone who came out, cheered, and staged demonstrations were not just young, simple, unemployed people or anarchists. Those groups were joined by professionals, doctors, lawyers, university professors, intellectuals, journalists and the symbols of the country’s economy, law, science, literature, and arts. Some soldiers even surrendered their weapons and joined the revolution. All people rose to the occasion from Cairo, Alexandria , Al Mansoura, Al Fayoum, and the rest of the Egyptian districts.

Mubarak and his regime blinded their eyes and did not see the revolution through the lenses of reality and purity. They refused to believe that it sprung from sincerity and was ignited by rampant corruption, wasting of public money, and strong self-interest and opportunism. All of those characteristics transformed over time into overwhelming norms and values, consuming everything and everyone.

Therefore, the regime denied the driving forces of the revolution and failed to recognize the justice in protestors’ messages. If the regime were to recognize the truth behind the messages, then they would come face to face with their corruption, immorality, and fraud. Since they couldn’t bear to accept that, Mubarak and his regime fled from those accusations by accusing others of being accomplices and followers of ousted traitors. They arrogantly threatened, terrorized, and charged against demonstrators with camels and horses. It was as if the regime were immune because it still believed in its legitimacy, righteousness, and existence.

Nationalism was never – not for one day – politics. In the novel, “The Mother” by Maxim Gorky, the older, illiterate women were the engines of the revolution. Rejecting injustice, oppression, corruption, and tyranny is enough of an incentive in itself and does not require further prodding, influence, or instigation. It is a case of good battling with evil. Simply put, “good” is embodied in virtue, justice, equality, helping and sacrificing for the sake of others. “Evil” is the epitome of falsehood, forgery, theft, and assaulting and oppressing those in need.

In order to take root, do such actions need to be manipulated by external forces or fueled by foreign agendas? Could such outside forces be behind what the Egyptian streets are witnessing today? No way. Money cannot buy a revolution. It lies in interior forces; purity, faith, the moment, will, and promise. Foreign forces can not even succeed in calming their own people if they were to rise, let alone igniting an entire revolution amongst other people. How could they if they aren’t singed with the other nation’s fire, threatened by its lack of security, and if their families and youth aren’t at risk?

What happened in Egypt is an overwhelming flood that cannot be directed, channeled, or controlled, or even contributed to by any external forces. It was mobilized by oppression, humiliation, tiring of patience, and abuse of tolerance. It is the hour of reckoning and retribution against those who abused the Egyptian people - not just the President, not only his government, but the managers and chairpersons of their governing bodies. Each beneficiary influenced the state, took seats the National Democratic Party, and manipulated their membership.  It was up to the President to know that the decades of oppression were beginning to explode, and its flames were increasingly rising with each rejection and denial.

This revolution may have been destined to grow because of the stubbornness of Mubarak and his ego. Those are the reasons why the revolution raged on to such a degree – not due to incitement of foreign agendas. All who were advising him to stay were the ones harming him, and opening the eyes of the people to see their reality for what it is. Whoever was encouraging him to remain in power was prodding more protesters to join in the demonstrations, and legitimizing the conviction and the need for the rebellious uprising. Mubarak is overthrown but his regime remains and his legacy lives on in Egyptian institutions. True reform will require revolution after revolution a thousand times over.

How easy it is for regime to fall when it is built on falsehood upon falsehood, and for a revolution to spark into flames beyond the imagination. It began with requesting for the president to step down and ended up transforming into a massive revolution against all the symbols of corruption.

They began falling and crumbling like quicksand, each grain cracking against the other, causing one another to slip further and further down, and so on. Their vulnerability and weakness exposed their shallowness, for they cannot stand on monuments but are instead built upon shaky foundations and pillars of sand. Suddenly, the cloaks of misinformation and the numbing censorship collapsed, and each functional group began prosecuting its personal pharaoh.  The Rose Al-Yousef Foundation demands the stepping down of the president of its board of directors, the Union of Journalists wants to drop its present council, public sector workers demanding trials of their managers and governing bodies, and more and more other groups began to build up the strength and the courage to act against those who exert their influence to suffocate and drain the rights of national interests.

It is enough to submit oneself to the devil in exchange for instruments of enslaving thousands of people; the rights to rule them. This is not aligned with Egyptians glorious history, cultural values, and ideals, but it is a submission to self-interest, personal benefit, and illegitimate gains through opportunism, corruption, and wasting of public money.

The National Council did not reflect the nation’s people as its members came to be through fraud, bribery, and entertainment of their personal goals and affairs on behalf of the people. Nor were the officials honest or working toward serving the masses, as all of them fall under the umbrella of traders searching for deals to fill their pockets and bank accounts by the millions.

The egregious contamination of an entire nation and its addiction to enslavement did not only confine itself to the government. It extended its greedy reach to the national army and tied it to serve the corrupt elite’s goals and interests. Generations grew up within the armed forces and were trained to obey the government and surrender to its resolutions. However, if the situation deteriorates and becomes desperate, the challenge poses itself to the individual; to be or not to be? How will the situation resolve itself?

As we have seen, at some point in the configuration of a nation, silence has no meaning and complacency has no place. At some point, the citizen must speak and the individual must choose. They may have been hurt, some were tortured, and attempts to tire their resolve were endless. From secret intelligence officers kidnapping people, while others were punished by the military, as we have witnessed, others may die in unexpected moments. Everything is permissible but there is no other choice. There was no time left for thinking, sleeping, or escaping from the absence of confrontation. The hour of truth sounded and the clock is ticking.

Wael Ghonim’s tears are symbols of Egyptian youth, tossing water at the fire of the revolution when he was released after 12 days of detention. When he saw pictures of his fellow martyrs who died before the blooming of their youth, roses cut before they even blossomed, Ghonim realized the tragic toll that the youth took on his behalf. It hit Ghonim that not only did his position subject himself to imprisonment and death threats but also subjected thousands of other young men to the same destiny. His conscience was tortured because it is he who escaped while the youth who defended him did not. Ghonim wept because he couldn’t bear the guilt of causing the families who lost their young the grieve, which was only heightened by investigators questioning the sanctity of his intentions, accusing him of overexciting and endangering people’s security, and causing young people to be detained and killed.

At that moment, one can either be for the revolution with all of its risks, dangerous conflicts, repercussions, and the hearts of people whose lives were robbed, or choose the path of surrender and submission.

Not to sitting on the sidelines! Make up your minds today. Either you are with or against the ringing bells of the revolution.
Mariam Al Saad-The Peninsula

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