SCAF – The Real Power Behind Egypt’s Elections

One day before the official declaration of the final results of who will rule their country, Egyptians in Cairo were pondering a curious fact: the runoff elections for the Egyptian presidency were between Mohammed Morsi, the candidate for the Muslim Brotherhood, and Ahmed Shafiq, Mubarak’s last prime minister. Yet the candidate who appeared to be the winner wasn’t even on the ballot: Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, head of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF). To many outsiders, this sounds like a joke. But to most Egyptians, it is reality.

Days before Egypt knew who would become the first democratically elected president in its thousand-year long history, SCAF decided to take the lead. A complementary constitutional declaration was issued in the middle of the night, granting unprecedented powers to the ruling military council and placing military rule above and beyond the presidency.

The new declaration strips the upcoming president of all power to control the military and deprives him of the right to declare war without prior permission from the decaying generals – not to mention the wide legislative powers granted to the military only a few days after the first democratically-elected parliament was dissolved.

It does not matter whether Egypt is ruled by the Brotherhood or Mubarak’s client; the military will be in control regardless of the electoral outcome in what seems to be a critically troubled transition towards democracy.

Preliminary results show a lead by the Brotherhood’s candidate Mohammed Morsi, and although Egyptian revolutionaries will not be that happy with the Brotherhood, Morsi’s lead remains a strong symbolic victory against the remnants of Mubarak’s regime, mastered by Ahmed Shafiq and his supporters. Yet the happiness of the revolutionaries was stunted when they woke up to a soft military coup. A central demand of the revolution – to put the military under civilian oversight – was shown to have been totally ignored by SCAF.

And SCAF wasn’t finished yet. A new National Defense Council, in which decisions will be made by majority vote, was formed. It is headed by the president and consists of 11 military generals and 7 civilians. The tasks and powers of the new council are yet to be defined, but observers believe it will further tighten the military’s iron fist over the country. The decades-long state of emergency has also not ended since the revolution. Less than one month after ending Mubarak’s emergency law, the Minister of Justice issued a new law that granted members of the military police and military intelligence wide powers to detain and arrest civilians. The new law is said to legalize the existence of the military inside the Egyptian streets, while the presence of soldiers would otherwise be unjustified without an ongoing state of emergency.

SCAF’s actions amount to a clear and troubling military coup. With the legislative power and most of the executive powers in their hands, the military is in full control over the process of drafting the country’s new constitution, thus making the situation even more critical.

While reporting the elections – whose turnout is believed to be around 40% – I talked to a poor woman who sold groceries in front of one of the polling station:

“May I ask you who did you vote for?” I said to her.

“I didn’t vote. Why should I?” the woman wondered.

“Because everyone is voting for their new president,” I said.

“Look, I have stayed for hours under the rain in January to elect parliament members, and more hours in the heat last month to elect the president in the first round. Now those hours are wasted, the parliament is dissolved. So why should I waste more hours if I know that the president will be controlled by the big guys?”

At that point, SCAF’s declaration hadn’t been issued. But today, I remember the words of a woman who reached a complete disbelief in democracy as her efforts went in vain. Who should be held accountable for her depression, and for the depression of millions of Egyptians who once believed in the revolution and thought their lives would be better? Egyptians who thought that they managed to end a decades-long dictatorship, but found it reincarnated again in the hands of 19 decaying military generals whose aim is only to protect their interests and their giant economic empire.

As thousands flock to Tahrir Square to protest against a so-called “constitutional” declaration of SCAF, millions of Egyptians already had enough of instability, a troubled economy and insecurity. Thousands of poor Egyptians are facing trial before military tribunals for supposed crimes committed during the revolution and many more were injured by the security forces, before being neglected by the new government. To many, revolution has come with a high cost to the individual.

The road ahead is very long. With the military retaining full control of the branches of government, the road towards democracy is troubled. It is hard to know what will be next for Egypt, but I believe the road will be stained with more blood in future. The generals will not be easy-going. They have much to protect; not only to defend themselves against possible prosecution, but also to shield their huge economic interests.

Yet despite all of this, some Egyptians feel that the revolution does not have the luxury of pessimism – the revolution has no choice but to continue!

By Mai Shams El-Din (@maishams)