DIPLOMATIST MAGAZINE
by Raymond Stock
August 2014

Hosni Mubarak and his driver arrive at an intersection. The driver asks his boss, “Which way, ya rayyis. (Mr. President)?” Instead of answering his question, Mubarak asks him, “Which way did Nasser turn?” The driver replies, “Always to the Left, ya rayyis.” “And which way did Sadat go?” “Always to the Right, ya rayyis.” “DON’T MOVE!” shouts Mubarak.

That famous joke from Mubarak’s long, ultimately aborted rule, in which he tries through timidity to escape the fate of his two bold predecessors – Gamal Abdel-Nasser, who died a humiliated, if still-idolised, failure in 1970, and Anwar Sadat, murdered in 1981 on the anniversary of his great military victory of 1973 – illustrates very well the remarkable difference (so far) between the nation’s controversial but wildly popular new president, former defence minister Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, and all three of these men, to whom al-Sisi is often compared.

The overwhelming election of the strong-willed but mysterious field marshal in May as Egypt’s sixth president marks a truly historic moment, in a land where history itself is almost a cliché. The ancient nation on the Nile and its charismatic new leader, inaugurated on June 8, confront a number of both old and new challenges and opportunities as well. The toughest challenge – and the most challenging opportunity – facing al-Sisi is to establish security after three years of mostly uncreative chaos, as the Middle East explodes in bloodshed, from Iraq to Syria, and from Israel to Gaza. Moreover, he must do this while completing a successful transition to something more than just resembling democracy, with a much greater space for civil society and individual liberty, despite his own widespread cult of the personality – a first for the country after five millennia of mostly highly-centralised, pharaonic-style rule. Only then can he hope to accomplish the comparatively mundane but essential task of restoring the barely-recovering post-revolution 2.0 economy, fuelled with a quick infusion of $12 billion in cash from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates after al-Sisi overthrew their enemy, former President Mohamed Morsi, the hardline leader of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), a year ago, following the largest demonstrations in human history.

Al-Sisi hopes to accomplish this by coaxing back foreign investors and tourists frightened off by three years of chaos following three decades of mostly relative calm – with the exception of an Islamist terrorist insurgency that claimed a thousand lives in the 1990s – under Mubarak. The economy will remain stuck in low gear or even go back into reverse if the slowly-escalating civil war does not end – with al-Sisi’s victory – soon…….

READ MORE
http://www.diplomatist.com/articles/article011.html