Saad-ad-Din Ibrahim, Visiting Professor of Political Sociology at Indiana University and Founder of the Ibn Khaldun Center for Development Studies, Egypt, spoke at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars today on “Freedom ‘After’ Speech.” He offered his own persecution by the Egyptian government as the tip of an iceberg and identified the enabling role the United States has played in the stalling of democratic reform in the Middle East. This is my paraphrase of his presentation.
Only four weeks ago Dr. Ibrahim was convicted yet again by the Egyptian government and would be arrested on his return. In this, he is in the company of many journalists who are routinely imprisoned for speaking truth to power. Dr. Ibrahim noted that he has the advantage of a high profile. The most recent campaign against him was for his establishment of the “Arab Democracy Foundation” in Qatar which the Egyptian government sees as a conspiracy to use Qatari money and American power to achieve “regime change.” 21 suits have been filed in court against Ibrahim of which the recent conviction was one. If convicted on all charges he would serve 60 years in prison.
When those who detained and tortured Imad-al-Kabir recorded their acts for posterity, there was a scandal that required the prosecution of the torturers, but the journalist who broke the story a year and a half ago has since been arrested and tortured himself. The head of state responsible for this situation has been the recipient of billions of dollars in American foreign aid. Since the Egyptian economy has been growing rapidly in recent years, the question arises as to why Egypt cannot feed its own people? Those who ask this question are “hounded, tried, and thrown in prison.”
After the international outrage over the mistreatment of Dr. Ibrahim last time, the government has learned not to prosecute its critics directly, but to have ruling party members sue directly, so the government can claim “we have nothing to do with this.” However, it is the government that detains those litigated against for fear he or she may escape. If they can’t find the target of the persecution, they will arrest his or her relatives as hostages. Sometimes the torture of family members is practiced in front of the dissident to humiliate him or to elicit information that could be used to indict or convict.
Dr. Ibrahim cites the Helsinki accord as a desirable precedent, in which the Soviet block states were told that aid and favorable treatment would be contingent on reforms that may have seemed fuzzy at the time, but became a landslide in the succeeding years.
Mubarak’s regime has insulated itself from pressure to reform by a series of excuses. Mubarak’s trump card is the claim that if he eases up, the Islamists will take over. But if you believe in democracy, you have to allow people to elect their own leaders whether you like them or not. And in Turkey, Bahrain, Kuwait, and many other countries Islamists have come to power and acted responsibly. Why the boogeyman in Egypt?
Another card he plays is to present himself as a peacemaker in the Palestinian-Israeli dispute. But what has he done? Sadat’s achievement has not been advanced one inch by Mubarak.
The fact that Ibrahim blew the whistle on Mubarak’s scheme to place his son in succession was the beginning of his problems. He crossed a red line when he coined an Arabic word meaning “republican dynasty.” The newspaper that published the article disappeared. He crossed a third red line when he defended the Coptic (Christian) minority.
Finally, Dr. Ibrahim holds the Egyptian regime responsible for any religious extremism that may exist in Egypt as a backlash against the oppression of the Egyptian state. Under Mubarak support for the Muslim Brotherhood has gone from 2% to 20%. What kind of a bulwark for secularism is this? But it is unfair to label all the religiously motivated political activists as extremists in any case.
The army remains Mubarak’s last stronghold of support. By law, no one may challenge the army. Yet, we have discovered that the ranks to which the mandatory retirement age applies has been successively lowered, but the President has been given the power to make exceptions. This is his means of insuring loyalty of the army if they dislike his chosen successor.
Bush raised hopes with his “freedom agenda” for the Middle East, but when Hamas was elected, the Bush administration retreated, betraying the democrats in the region. In a meeting in Prague, President Bush personally assured Dr. Ibrahim that in his remaining 18 months in office we would see that he is still committed to the freedom agenda, and that he himself is “a dissident.” Since then it has remained an unfulfilled promise. Dr. Ibrahim says he hopes whoever would succeed him will proceed in a more enlightened and consistent manner.
Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad, Ph.D.
Minaret of Freedom Institute
minaret.org
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