Why You Should Not Trust The Salafi's

We were fourteen parties, last year, in a meeting with SCAF to put together a constitutional committee to write a new constitution for Egypt.
There had been a major rift between the El Nour leadership. Instead of Emad Abdel Ghafour, the head of the party, two new faces were among us: Moustapha Khalifa, and Younes Makhioun were now representing the El Nour Party in the meeting.
The meeting started at 9am and lasted through till 9pm. The discussions around the names and the representation of the constitutional committee had lasted for 10 days. Today we were putting the final touches to it. The last touches took us over ten hours. The major players in the negotiations surprisingly were Ayman Nour (El Ghad El Thawra party)  and El Sayed El Badawi (Wafd Party). They were the best prepared for this meeting because they had stayed up the night before , till the wee hours of the morning, in the Maadi Sofitel Hotel negotiating with the Political Islam parties the names to be proposed for the constitutional committee. There was a lot of rancor towards these negotiators by the remaining members of the meeting because we were excluded from this late night meeting. Anger was put aside for the better good of this extremely important historic meeting.
The negotiations were difficult and prolonged. A lunch break was taken in the afternoon. Haggling and negotiations prevailed during the lunch. Several tea breaks were taken during the afternoon discussions. This was to give us a chance to contact our party leadership for consultation on the names of the proposed members of the committee.
By 8pm we were all extremely exhausted and we finally reached consensus on the names of the constitutional committee. Fifty percent of the names agreed upon were pro a secular constitution and the remaining fifty were pro a political Islam constitutional committee.
The last tea break was taken before we were to go out to relay the breakthrough news to the hundreds of reporters waiting for us in the Ministry of Defense courtyard since noon.
We got back to the conference room for the closing session. Then Moustapha Khalifa requested to make a statement. Field Marshal Tantawi gave him the word. Mr. Khalifa in a very soft and docile voice dropped his bombshell statement. He told us that the Salafi's elected him and his party in to power solely on the premise that they will uphold Sharia in their governance. The new constitution must be written in accordance with Sharia law and nothing else. He therefore could not accept a constitutional committee that did not have a majority of 51% members belonging to political Islam! The rest is history.
This is where the Salafis stand. The political romantics who believe they are more benign than the Muslim Brotherhood are strongly mistaken. I fully agree with those calling for the disbanding of political parties whose origins are built on a religious premise. Once we have our next parliamentary elections, which will be based on a well written constitution, will we be able to take the Salafists demands in to consideration. Prior to that, they should not keep us hostage by threatening to side with the deposed President and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Predictions for the 30th of June protest outcomes are galore!

Political Pundits Abound

Political naiveté prevails.

We shall wake up on June 30th and witness thousands of truly patriotic people marching in to the streets. Myself included. The rioters shall demand for the departure of  President Morsi and demand for early presidential elections. I agree with all of you who see he has used his election to cement a totally un-democratic rule of lawlessness in a country desperately in need of the rule of law. I too cannot watch his speeches, or follow his narrative. He is unfit to be the president of this great nation. However he is the first, so called, "democratically" elected President of Egypt.

There may be confrontations between the peaceful marchers and Islamists. Incriminations will abound. The old NDP and their cronies will be suspect, so will the Political Islamists with their conniving Machiavellian orchestrators. The riots may last a few days and there may be some blood shed. In the absence of a strong police force the military may be asked to intervene, and they shall intervene. They shall intervene to break up the bloodletting and they will go back to their barracks. Under no circumstance shall they revolt against the President. They shall keep the status quo until the next presidential elections. So for those of you who have hopes for a military coup, I hate to disappoint you. There shall be none. The military shall only intervene once the hungry masses start revolting against the regime for not providing the very basic of their needs. This day will inevitably arrive, based on the totally incompetent governance performance of Political Islam in power.

Therefore our survival as a nation depends on the enlightened many of our youth, and the seasoned younger politicians, to come up with a well versed, authentic political ideology. One that people can relate to. One that embraces secularism and liberalism yet proposes it in a moderate Islamic language appealing to the people, and especially the youth. This ideology shall be embraced by a party. A party of the people, led by the youth, clean seasoned politicians, intellectuals, and technocrats of Egypt. Then comes the most important, most crucial, and most essential part. Raising money. There is no political system in the world which is not funded. The successful political parties are heavily funded, while the marginal ones are underfunded. The only reason Political Islam has been successful is because their coffers are extremely full. They also know how to obtain their funds through avenues we are totally unfamiliar with. The MB spent over 600 million Egyptian Pounds  just only on the presidential elections. As we speak, they have already mobilized in all Governorates in preparation for the Parliamentary elections. Hundreds of millions are being lavished on the unsuspecting majority of Egyptians who can barely survive on a day's meal. The Salafis are equally funded. Wahabi Saudi Sheikhs are on a vendetta path with Qatar because of its funding of the Brotherhood. Furthermore, they firmly believe that they will fill up the void for those who voted for the Brotherhood, and who are now disenchanted. In the absence of an opposition, they believe they will be the benefactors of the protest votes against the Muslim Brotherhood in the next parliamentary elections. Some romantics think the Salafis are more benign and a better choice than the brotherhood. They are deluded. The Salafis, once understanding how the political system functions, will be one hundred times more repressive than the Brothers.

Sorry to burst your bubble my fellow Egyptians. Simply put: Our true salvation lies in the understanding that a solid and effective opposition lies in a group of people who can articulate a very well written political ideology which is backed by a huge financial establishment.

Deep down in my heart, it pains me to write these words because I would wish, more than anything, for a revolt that would remove this tyrannical rule forever. Therefore if you disagree with me and want to bet otherwise, I am willing to take you on. Because this is one bet I would be most happy and willing to lose.

May God guide us all to what is best for our great nation and people.