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In Egypt, some see a glimmer of change
Neil MacFarquhar/NYT NYT
Wednesday, August 11, 2004
CAIRO Conducting his first news conference, Egypt's new tourism minister tried to duck a question about whether political reform here should include sweeping changes like direct presidential elections. Before Washington started talking about political reform in the Middle East, even raising the topic of such elections was considered taboo because it implied criticism of the aging president, Hosni Mubarak, for clinging to the job for 23 years and showing no signs of bowing out gracefully. Yet, the climate has shifted, however slightly, and these days the subject emerges occasionally, to the evident consternation of technocrats like the tourism minister, Ahmed El-Maghraby, a 49-year-old business tycoon. "I am not a political minister," said Maghraby, whose family interests include the largest hotel management group in the country, a chain of eyeglass stores and Egypt's most renowned brand of jam. "Although my political education is not yet fully completed, I intend to be politically indoctrinated in the shortest possible time and have ready answers for political questions."
Run for the mosque, Ahmed!
He then proves that the aforementioned education has, in fact, started, by echoing remarks from his new boss about how Egypt must avoid changing too fast lest it hit sudden turbulence. Political change in the Middle East might have better prospects of gaining traction in Egypt than say, Iraq, regional analysts believe, because the necessary institutions have long existed, albeit now in anemic form. The generally unspoken subtext, which Al-Masri Al-Yom, a new independent daily launched in June actually had the gumption to say in print, is that all important decisions go back to Mubarak. So any political reform will almost certainly be confined to the margins as long as he remains alive president. Pessimists in Egypt (some say realists) look around and see a political system barely altered since the 1952 revolution, when a group of army officers tossed out the monarchy and asphyxiated the democratic system slowly emerging from Britain's colonial tutelage.
Can't be like India, nope, never!
President Gamal Abdel Nasser was a military autocrat, followed by another, Anwar "sandman" Sadat, followed by a third, Mubarak, now 76. Until the constitution that granted the presidency such sweeping powers is replaced and long-standing emergency laws rescinded, the pessimists say, there is no hope for Egypt to join the club of truly free countries. Optimists spy the glimmerings of change, however, pushed not least by the fact that Mubarak's handsome young son, Gamal, 40, harbors presidential ambitions. Given his absence of a military background, the sole route left open is to cast himself as a reformer.
Posted by: Zenster 2004-08-11
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=40271