"Mubarak & Suleiman still running things? ..."

"Friday-Lunch-Club"

".. As I  said before, there are signs of loss of patience coming from the military council that is running the show her. Does that mean necessarily that they will "abort" the demands of the population?. My impression is that this whole thing can go either way as I expressed before but both ways do not include a military dictatorship.

 The military issued a communique ordering total ban of strikes and sit-ins, They also sent the MP to Tahrir square to clear it "within half hour" as they said or else they will be arrested.
All this will open the door to more skepticism. It will show that optimism is kind of childish illusions. I heard what the youth said following their meeting with Gen Hegazy and another Gen from the council. And it was indeed childish optimism. The rumor now is that Mubarak is running the thing from Sharm. Shafiq said he is there and the council said the Gen Sulliman will have a role in the new set of things (Col Lang was right in hinting that  Sulliman may not be history).

Still, I think that the military will never be able to dismiss the demands of the population even if they want. This uprising toppled an unprecedentedly oppressive regime. The youth are preparing for next Friday. I am not sure what will happen then but the invitation for a very large gathering at Tahrir SQ is flying very quickly.

Any predictions about the course of events in the next phase should be within the boundaries of the situation on the ground. If predictions are oscillating between a next dictatorship or a next Jeffersonian governance it simply means that the solid realities on the ground are not as clear as they should be. There was a wall and it was broken. The wall of fear was high in Egypt and the population broke it. In the current situation there will be countless attempts to impose a regime that does not fulfill the core of the demands of the population.

The next few months will reveal how much of this core will be achieved. But I can tell you that now there are tens of new political parties are being formed. No license and no state security permission and no authorization by the ruling party. Hundreds of new electronic sites. An extensive debate is going on everywhere.

There are those who remember what happened in July 1952 and warn of a replay. But a replay is absolutely impossible. 52 was a result of the the 2nd world war which left deep impact on the socio-economic structure of Egypt, the British occupation which did not leave despite promises of the contrary if Egypt cooperated during the war,  the inability of political parties of that epoch to achieve the aspiration of the population and the bi-polar world order of that time.
In any case, there is now an arms wrestling match going on. But either way we will see something new. The margin that both sides are moving within is already defined. Losses and gains are specified by this margin. And you can not find in it a military dictatorship..."

Posted by G, Z, or B at 9:36 AM

River to Sea Uprooted Palestinian