Egyptian Army... Dismiss!

Yes, we are lucky the Egyptian army, during the 18 days of our revolution, decided not to bombard us like its counterparts in neighboring countries, which are now witnessing their own revolts, did, including Libya, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria. We are lucky indeed, for reasons that include the fact the our army is a conscript army and that our society is largely homogenous where the army does not represent a particular ethnic or religious faction (as is the case in Syria or in Bahrain, for instance), but this does not mean that the army is, can, or should be for that matter, a guardian of the revolution. The army’s actions during the revolution can, at best, be described as neutral. On Wednesday, February 2, also known among Egyptians as Bloody Wednesday or the Battle of the Camel (because of the surreal scene of camels and horses being brought into downtown Cairo, in Tahrir Square, to attack protesters), the army decided not to take sides, apart from a few brave soldiers and officers who decided to fire their arms to disperse thugs who were terrorizing peaceful protesters.

In a further attempt to at least neutralize the army, Egyptians have, from day one, chanted ‘the people and the army are one hand.’ However, the stance of the army has gradually evolved, from neutrality, to an attempt to appear like the protector of the people and the guardian of the revolution by recognizing the people and their revolution as the only source of legitimacy at the time of the toppling of the Mubarak regime, to an attempt to appease the people by presenting options and waiting for the popular response and finally, by its decision to take things into its own hands and squash protests, gravitating more and more towards the support of the conservative morality and interests of the (upper) middle-class which is inclined to favor ‘stability’ and a ‘return to normalcy,’ is obsessing about the now-notorious and joke-triggering ‘production wheel’ and is infamous for its eternal suspicion of the working class and its demands.

The Egyptian army has gotten away with the approval of the constitutional amendments, which to me was not the ideal scenario, because, among other reasons, it sent the wrong signal to the army that the majority of the Egyptian people were willing to go ahead with less than the needed radical reforms. Now, the army realizes that the approval of the constitutional amendments requires it to issue a declaration of constitutional principles containing the amended articles, rather than bring back to life the 1971 constitution, which could have jeopardized the status of the army from a constitutional point of view, potentially rendering all its decrees unconstitutional. The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) is currently stalling and seems, at best, to be confused about the way forward. We are now being told that a second committee disagreed as to the formulation of the declaration of constitutional amendments put forward by the first committee that had drafted them, and that a third committee combining members of both committees as well as other public figures is to be formed to put together a final draft of the declaration. This mayhem of committees, with no transparency and no clear timetable, has to stop, and the SCAF has to (re-)engage in an open dialogue with the different political forces to draft the way forward.

We are also told that the SCAF is inclined to hold parliamentary elections in September 2011 and to postpone presidential elections to June 2012 following the issuing of a new constitution. The SCAF issued a statement today to deny that presidential elections are to be postponed to 2012, without providing any clear timetable. The fact that the SCAF is stalling and sending out mixed signals is worrisome. The army is not meant, designed or competent enough to rule, and a security logic in running the country is not a viable, effective or, most importantly, a democratic one. The army should not run the country for half a year, a year, or a year and a half more. If presidential elections are to be postponed after the issuing of a new constitution, then an interim presidential council must be elected as soon as possible to govern in the meantime. The modalities of such elections are to be determined through dialogue with the various political forces, but stalling and opacity are not going to be acceptable.

The army has committed in the past month and a half various violation and transgression whose perpetrators should be held accountable: military trials of civilians have become the norm, sending many civilians to prisons without the possibility of an appeal; the army has been stalling to put to trial members of the police responsible for the killing of hundreds of Egyptians and the injuring of thousands more, as well as prominent political figures and pillars of the Mubarak regime responsible for corruption among other crimes; the army has asked the interim government to prepare a draft law outlawing protests and strikes under the pretext of safeguarding the revolution and speeding up a return to normalcy; the army tortured many activists, notably when it decided to brutally disperse protesters in Tahrir Square on March 9 and subjected many women activists to strip-searches where their photographs were taken by soldiers, and forced them to take ‘virginity tests;’ in a flagrant breach of academic liberties, the army entered, on March 23, the Cairo University campus, for the first time in decades, to violently disperse the sit-in staged by Communications students calling for the resignation of their dean.

Yes, the army has committed all these atrocities, and many more, and for all these reasons, for the safeguard of human rights and human dignity and for the protection of our nascent democracy, the Egyptian army has to realize the importance of yielding power to a civilian government, be it transitional, and go back to its barracks as soon as possible. If military commands are what the generals properly understand, then it is about time the Egyptian people said it loud and clear: ‘Egyptian army… Dis-MISS!’