Almost a quarter of a century ago, Turkish Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel told the generals who had ousted him: “You may gain power with a bayonet, but you can’t sit on it.” That point is now coming home to the Egyptian military junta as it tries to cope with a deepening crisis.
Almost a month after they ousted the country’s first freely elected president, the generals appear divided over what to do next.
Originally, Defense Minister Gen. Abdul-Fattah al-Sissi and the others claimed they’d intervened to help demonstrators in Tahrir Square against President Mohammed Morsi. Last week, however, al-Sissi went on TV to ask the demonstrators to come to his help in dislodging Morsi’s supporters from positions they’ve seized in Cairo and several other cities.
Having shot more than 300 pro-Morsi demonstrators dead in the streets, al-Sissi’s forces seem unable to impose the calm he promised. The shootings, described as “massacres” even by some of al-Sissi’s allies, are forcing the various players in this cacophony to review their positions.
The military are starting to divide into two camps. Several active and retired officers close to Gen. Sami Annan, a former chief of staff, urge the appointment of a “consensus” prime minister with a program for early elections. They also want Morsi released and invited to negotiations on the timetable for the transition.
A second group of officers, close to al-Sissi, believe that only direct military rule can save the situation. The political elite, they claim, is too riven by suspicion and hatred to be able to restore the authority of state, now shattered in many parts of the country.
There are signs that al-Sissi himself may be tempted by direct rule. In recent days he has appeared with military decorations designating him as a “hero” several times over, although he has never fought in any war. His radio and TV tone has also changed — he no longer reads in a flat voice, but attempts eloquence, the way Arabs like.
Al-Sissi won’t run for president when and if there is an election, his spokesman insists — but his agents are busy distributing his pictures all over Egypt.
Al-Sissi’s associates see him as the new Gamal Adul-Nasser, the colonel who led the 1952 coup that led Egypt into 60 years of military dictatorship. Sources close to al-Sissi claim that several key foreign powers, among them the United States and Saudi Arabia, favor direct military rule for the foreseeable future.
The civilian façade hastily put together to support the military is also cracking. According to my sources, interim Prime Minister Hazem al-Beblawi has indicated he wants to step down, and Foreign Minister Nabeel Fahmy is also reportedly thinking of jumping ship before it’s too late.
Mohammed el-Baradaei, the maverick named vice president in charge of contact with foreign powers, has started distancing himself from the junta by publicly criticizing the massacre of demonstrators in Cairo and Alexandria.
The massacres have also been publicly condemned by the leadership of al-Azhar in Cairo, the chief theological center of Sunni Islam and an initial supporter of al-Sissi’s coup d’etat.
Even some of the activists in the Tammarrod (Rebellion) movement, which spearheaded the popular uprising against Morsi, now admit, at least in private, that building democracy with tanks and armored cars may be a contradiction in terms.
Meanwhile, the publication of charges against Morsi has further angered his supporters. The charges all relate to his presidential policies and thus should be covered by the principle of sovereign immunity, under which a president cannot be prosecuted the exercise of his executive powers.
Apologists for the coup had expressed the hope that the military would quickly restore law and order, restart the economy and create a new template for democratization. It’s now clear that the generals can’t achieve those objectives, even if they wanted to.
Law and order is breaking down across the nation, while the economic meltdown accelerates. Worse still, government agencies are gradually paralyzed by defections, strikes and growing resentment about military presence in the ministries.
The military seem to have only one way of dealing with protestors: killing them in the streets with sniper fire. As for creating a new template for democratization, all signs indicate movement in the opposite direction.
As usual, the Obama administration is equivocating, thus rendering the United States — all its immense cultural, political and economic power notwithstanding — irrelevant as far as the Egyptian crisis is concerned.