On January 25, 2011, widespread protests began in Egypt which would foreshadow the fall of the regime of Hosni Mubarak. After three weeks, the constitution and parliament of Egypt was dissolved. Grievances of Egyptian protesters were focused on legal and political issues including police brutality,state of emergency laws, lack of free elections and freedom of speech, corruption, and economic issues including high unemployment, food price inflation and low wages. (Source: Wikipedia) On June 24, 2012, Mohammed Morsi was declared the winner of Egypt's first democratic election. Still, Egypt has yet to draft a new constitution. This is becoming a problem.
Before the election of Morsi, a constitution was being drafted by the Constituent Assembly. This first assembly, not democratically elected, but appointed by the predominately fundamentalist parliament, was incredibly unpopular, and was suspended by Egypt's Supreme Constitutional Court. On June 7, 2012, just before Morsi was sworn in, a deal to create a more balanced Constituent Assembly was brokered. Despite this effort, the fundamentalists still were able to form a voting bloc in the majority. This month, numerous appointees withdrew from the assembly in protest of a lack of popular consensus for the new constitution. While the assembly continues to work out the draft without them, they lack the necessary quorum to ratify the Constitution by popular vote.
This week, Mohammed Morsi, after negotiating a cease-fire between Gaza and Israel, issued broad decree placing his actions above the review of the Supreme Constitutional Court. Despite explanations that suggest that he would only exercise his new self-declared authority on issues of national sovereignty and to protect the process of drafting the new Constitution, he has stated he will not amend the declaration. the Egyptian people are not impressed.
According to Russia Today, the death toll from rioting has reached 300 as police and pro-Morsi vigilantes clash with protesters. Clearly the powers which Morsi has decreed for himself not only represent the very kind of state of emergency laws which were a reason for the 2011 revolution, but also they have created (along with the lingering lack of a constitution) a state of emergency in and of itself. Egypt is not the only country where religious fundamentalists attempt to hijack the political process at every turn. This also happens in America.
In America, we long ago decided to prevent a state religion. Free thought is protected by our First Amendment. But keep in mind it was an Amendment, and was not included in the originally ratified Constitution. It's a natural right we had to work to include in our body of laws. One thing we did get right - the Preamble to the Constitution, in which one of the goals of the Constitution is to "insure domestic tranquillity." This is something Egypt desperately needs now. I hope Egypt gets it right.
