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Why have they progressed while we have failed?

December 16, 2014 at 5:26 pm

There is a big difference between us and them, but it wasn’t always that way. They used to be like us, maybe even worse 100 years ago, but we are the ones who are still living in the past. There are those amongst us trying to take us back to the past due to the fact that they are deluded into believing that it is the magic solution. There are those who want to take us back to our “religious” past and the glory of Islam and the caliphate 1,400 years ago, when the people and the empires were different; others want to take us back to the more recent past, to 60 years ago when the military had its say in Egypt and the Middle East.

There are also those who have power in Egypt who are working to take us back to another past but their failure has been proven; they closed the political arena, the military controlled everything and the security-led, oppressive and authoritarian government trumped all values of freedom, democracy, good governance, accountability, transparency and human rights. These are the values that have been proven to be successful and have contributed to the progress made by “them”. Who are they? They are the non-believing and crusader West who want to destroy Islam, according to the conspiracy theory pushed by the fundamentalists.

What is the difference between us and “them”? What made them organised, productive and civilised while we are backwards, chaotic and ignorant? Is it only the conspiracies against Islam or the Egyptian army, as claimed by the Islamists or the military, nationalists and Nasserites? It is true that the world is not conspiracy-free, or lacking in hatred and racism as well as long-term plots that ensure the West’s superiority and prevent any competition against globalisation and Western civilisation. However, where is our civilisation? Where is our productivity?

What should we do? How can we, practically-speaking (and not by means of the media), confront the West’s alleged conspiracies? Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi does not dare to talk about them, explain them or confront the West with them when Egypt asks for foreign aid and funding from the West during his occasional begging trips overseas.

To the nationalists, military and Al-Sisi and his supporters I say this: why are you making all this effort to beg from the West, which conspires against us, if all the aid and funding is actually part of the conspiracy? How can you say to us that Germany, France, Britain and America, along with Turkey, Qatar and Israel, are conspiring against us day and night while Al-Sisi is begging from all of them, except Qatar and Turkey? If we read our history and theirs of 300-350 years ago, we will find they “they” revolted against ignorance, superstition, individual rule and the involvement of religion in politics. They revolted against corruption in the military institution which ruled and controlled everything and they revolted against sanctifying individuals and rules. This has allowed them to become what they are while we have made no intellectual, philosophical, technical or industrial progress for centuries. This is the difference between us and them. The difference also lies in their application of the values they called for, even if it was done after painful disputes, wars and traumatic experiences; they have learned and continue to learn from their mistakes and crimes.

They apply the concept of the rule of law to themselves and it is applied to everyone, more or less. It is natural to see a European minister paying a fine for not paying the metro fare, or a citizen criticising the prime minister and not being executed in the streets. We even see European politicians asking for forgiveness from angry citizens and defending their right to express themselves openly. This is the difference between a developed country that actually applies the concept of the rule of law and a failed state that does not respect the law and applies it brutally, arbitrarily and unjustly against any opposition. All of this while the leadership, the president, the police, the army and the ministers, as well as all of the friends, family and relatives of Egyptian officials, are above the law and are not held accountable or criticised.

There are no modern developed states that lie about constitutional entitlements and you don’t find any conflict between their constitution and their laws; nor do you find an arsenal of lies that have been cooked up for decades and overlap, and at times contradict each other. We do not see “them” occasionally applying the full force of the law and the constitution on the weak or the oppressed while we ignore the law and constitution when it comes to accountability for the president or the elite. There is a Great Lie with which we are preoccupied: it is about the military’s supposed commitment and seriousness about applying the law equally. This is utterly false; the military is only good at ruthless domination.

We have also been told lies about respecting the constitution and the law, while we can easily point to more than 20 state and military violations of the former, as well as hundreds of official violations of military laws that have been in place since 1952. There have also been lies told by the leadership’s delegation and loyal organisations in Geneva, notably that we have a sound constitution regarding civil freedoms. Although this may be true in theory, in practice it is nothing but ink on government documents and the government is the first to violate the constitution and law.

The leadership and its institutions claim that there are no political detainees, but fail to mention the tens of thousands of individuals who have been detained on trumped-up charges without serious trials and who have been held for over a year. In Egypt’s prisons, the violent jihadi is put with the Muslim Brotherhood member, the secular revolutionist and those who were taken by mistake. Nevertheless, such distinctions disappear and everyone leaves prison with hatred for the state, leadership and life itself; we must remember this. The Military Council delegation did not mention the fact that its prisoners are crammed into prisons with no medical or psychological care, and that political prisoners leave prison as terrorists. They haven’t mentioned the fact that those with violent tendencies will leave prison even more hostile, commit more crimes and probably become drug addicts. The Council didn’t talk about those who were sentenced to three years on false charges of participating in a demonstration, nor did it talk about the fabricated accusations, the judiciary that is operated by remote control or the judges and prosecutors who are making political speeches and declaring publicly their hatred for the defendants.

Al-Sisi spoke about how Egyptian law is similar to the French protest law, but he manipulated his words and did not mention the punishments declared in the French protest law or in the other European countries. Under America’s protest law, the punishment ranges from fines to confinement, and from public service to open prisons; this, only in the event that individuals are charged with the intent to break the law deliberately, and after the terms of the law are repeated along with the issue of written warnings. In any case, getting permission for protests to take place is a relatively easy process. Al-Sisi also failed to mention that in France and Europe, only those who deliberately steal and vandalise and who have been proven to have done so with irrefutable evidence are imprisoned; they are not sent to jail on the testimony of a corrupt police officer or a fake recording, which was the case with myself and hundreds of revolutionary youth.

Al-Sisi and his government are the first to break the law and lie with a clear conscience. If the head of the state is doing this, then what do we expect from the people, who see the president, his government, police, and army breaking the law and violating the constitution? Is making the traffic law harsher the solution? Or is applying the law to the leaders before the citizens the solution?

The difference between us and the “infidel” West, as described by the Islamists, or the “conspiring” West, as referred to by the military and nationalists, is the fact that “they” apply the constitution and laws religiously and firmly. We, however, have the military police state which treats the constitution as ink on paper, and only applies the law against the weak or the opposition “when needed”.

They have democratic legislation, and real social dialogue, followed by firm application of the law on everyone. We have authoritarian legislation, without any dialogue, then optional and selective application of the legal process. In our case, respect for the law is rare, while their respect of the law underpins the state.

Now do you see why they are progressing while we are failing?

Translated from Al-Araby Al-Jadid, 16 December, 2014

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.