The Egyptian revolution establishes a new social contract and values

I lived to witness and participate in the Egyptian Revolution of January 25, 2011 until the moment I wrote this column on Sunday, 6th of February. I saw million of Egyptians, Muslims and Christians from all trends and beliefs – the Egyptian people are united under the banner of the spontaneous popular revolution, against the tyrannical regime which is corrupt from the top to the lowest rank.

From the holy Pharaoh, who clings to his throne and sheds the blood of his people, to his corrupt government and ruling party, which hires the thugs to kill the young people, to the forged parliament, which is dominated by the MPs of drugs, bribes, and women. Its elite is called “ the intellectual elite,” which sold its principles and conscience and ruined education, culture and public and private morality, and misled the public opinion collectively and individually, for the sake of its own interests or in order to obtain a small or an important post in the government.

Young men and women spontaneously took to the streets, left their houses, self-driven and protecting themselves, after the police and security officers failed and pulled out. The elite controlling media and cultural life was overthrown, the Wise Men committee which is approaching the pinnacle of wealth and power, and opportunist party leaders, who backed the ruling regime, secretly and publicly over the past half century. Opportunism and double standard moral values collapsed after corrupting the State, the family and individuals. After causing chaos in the name of security, dictatorship in the name of democracy, poverty and unemployment in the name of development and prosperity, and prostitution and adultery in the name of morality and freedom of choice. Humiliation and submissive compliance with the American-Israeli imperialism in the name of aid and partnership, friendship or the peace process, and the imprisonment of real, creative and authentic writers and journalists inside cells or isolating them and tarnishing their reputation or discrediting and exiling them whether at home or abroad.

Millions of Egyptian men and women took to the streets. Egyptians who come from all districts, villages, governorates and cities, from Aswan to Alexandria, Suez to Port Said, and every inch of the homeland, all the way to the capital, Cairo, to Tahrir Square – “Liberation square” – which became our camp!

Where we camped there for 11 days in a row, on the asphalt and inside tents, it is like one solid block of men and women. We did not leave our place. We were attacked by police disguised in civilian clothes who stormed into the Square, as happened on Wednesday, the 2nd of February, along with hired gangs, paid by the regime, where each member was bribed – fifty pounds and a Kentucky Fried Chicken meal for low rank soldiers, and more bribes with higher ranks.

They attacked us in Liberation Square riding camels and horses, armed with all kinds of weapons. One of the horses was about to crush me while I was standing there in the square with the young people, who carried me away from the convoy of the barbarian Hagana.

I saw them with my own eyes, riding horses and camels and galloping all over, shooting fire everywhere. Amid the dust and smoke that covered the ground and buildings around it, I saw fire balls flying in the air, and young people dying and blood being shed. A semi-war battle was ensued between the mercenaries of the regime and the peaceful Egyptian people who called for freedom, dignity, and justice.

The defense committee of the revolutionary youth was able to triumph over the thugs and arrest some of the horse and camel riders, around 100 mercenaries, seizing their identity cards. They included officers from the State Security, riot police, low rank policemen, some jobless men, thugs from the street gangs and prisoners who fled during the beginning the revolution.

Some admitted they were paid 200 LE each, and were promised 5000 LE if they succeeded in dispersing the young people and kicking them out of the square, or finished the protesters off with swords, Molotov Cocktails and knives. Ironically, they call the anti-regime protesters ‘those idles who cause chaos and riot,’ according to the loyal assistants of Mubarak who gave orders and money to these thugs to intimidate us.

Young people who set up tents on the ground of the square to rest for a few hours of the night, mothers taking their children slept over outside in the cold rain, hundreds of young girls who were never sexually harassed, walking around raising their heads and feeling the freedom, dignity and equality among their associates. The Copts are side by side with Muslims, and surprisingly I was surrounded by some young men from the Muslim Brotherhood, who told me, “we disagree with some of your writings, but we respect and love you because you did not show hypocrisy towards any power at home or abroad.”

While I was walking in the square, people from all political currents and ideologies came to me, talking to me with open arms, saying: “Dr. Nawal, we are the new generations that have read your books and were inspired by your creativity, rebellion and revolutions.”

I suppressed my tears and told them, “This is such a gala for all of us, for all of us, the festival of freedom, dignity, justice, creativity and rebellion.”

A young woman called Rania Refaat said, “We demand a new civil constitution that does not differentiate between people on the basis of religion, sex, creed, race or other,” and another young Christian man named Boutros Dawood said, “we want a new civil unified law for personal status for all people without discrimination on the basis of religion, sex or creed or sect.”

A young man named Tariq el-Demiry said the “youth made the revolution and we must choose our transitional government and form a national committee to change the constitution,” while a young man named Mohammed Amin said, “We want to dissolve the People’s Assembly and Shura Council and hold free and fair elections to choose a new president and a new parliament.”

A young man named Ahmed Galal said, “We are a popular revolt that establishes a new social contract, not just demands, and our slogan of this revolution is ‘equality of freedom of social justice.’ The people who made this revolution are the ones who should put the rules for the new governance, choose the transitional government, select a National Committee to change the constitution, the committee of wise men of the revolution, so as not to allow opportunists (the owners of wealth and power) to impose on us committees of wise men who did not participate with us in this revolt.”

Now Egyptians who have been living in America or Europe come back to us to become the leaders of this revolution, but we say: “Those who led this revolution are the ones who are leading the revolution, where we have wise men committees at the age of 30 or 40 or 50. We have competencies in all scientific, economic and political fields, we are the ones who form a committee of wise men, and will choose our transitional government and form our national committee to change the constitution and laws.”

Mohammed Said said, “I feel proud for the first time in my life because I am Egyptian, and now despair and depression turned defeat into victory. We paid the price of freedom with the blood of our martyrs. There is no power to bring us back, never.”

The square has turned into an entire city: a hospital where injured and wounded lie, volunteer doctors and nurses from the masses of young people, volunteer residents and blankets, medicines, cotton and gauze, food and water, something like a dream and fantasy.

I live with the young men and women day and night. They formed committees: to sweep the square, to transport the injured to hospitals, to provide food and medicines, to take over the defense of the square and the protection of the protesters and respond to the lies of the regime and propaganda promoted by the state media, to nominate the names of the Transitional Government and the Committee of Wise Men, and others. The wall of the institutions and taboos which distinguishes between citizens, whether women or men, Muslim or Christian or other, faded.

We finally have become united, one people, not divided on the basis of sex, religion or other, all demanding the departure of Mubarak and his trial and his men in the party and the government for the bloodshed that took place on Wednesday 2nd of Feb and everyday since the 25th of January, trial for the corruption and tyranny over the past thirty years of Mubarak`s rule.

Nawal el-Saadawi is Egypt’s foremost feminist thinker and writer.

BM

Tags: Cairo, Demonstration, Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, Nawal el-Saadawi, Police Brutality, Revolution, Tahrir Square, Thugs

Section: Egypt, Featured Articles, Op-ed