Baheyya: ElBaradei is a wildcard
Issandr El Amrani
"Please God..."
One more ElBaradei link: Baheyya has woken from her recent slumber (first post since mid-October!) has given her take on the man:
Perhaps the scariest thing for Mubarak, wife, and son is that ElBaradei’s social democratic centrism, liberalism, and personal air of gravitas is rapidly forming him a constituency inside and outside Egypt. Like any dictator, the purpose of Mubarak’s existence is to snuff out the bottom-up formation of constituencies around rival groups or individuals. So far, Mubarak has succeeded in blocking or containing the growth of constituencies around challengers. Because elections are the time when constituency-building happens, they’ve always constituted an annoying but ultimately manageable nuisance for him. When the Ikhwan’s constituency-building threatened the parliamentary majority of Mubarak’s party in 2005, state violence was at the ready to strike at both voters and candidates. When Ayman Nour’s unexpected constituency-building in 2005 threatened to embarrass Mubarak, he mobilized his media and legal machine to smear Nour and put him safely behind bars. These tried and true tactics won’t work with ElBaradei. I’m going to enjoy sitting back and watching how the Mubaraks deal with this wildcard.
I couldn't agree more with the piece (and the cartoons she illustrates the piece with are great). Especially the fact that, as I've written before, ElBaradei is shining a spotlight on the upcoming parliamentary and presidential elections that will make the usual shenanigans a lot more difficult.
Reader Comments (3)
In general she makes some good points, but I have to say that I find the way he is being latched onto as a sort of instant cult-of-personality highlights opposition weaknesses as well in failing to connect to the grassroots. That and El-Baradei's support for the siege of Gaza wall, and years of refusal to face up to Israeli nukes, all sort of tarnish the guy. I get an image of someone who even if the impossible happened and he ended up President, would probably still be pretty heavily in Washington's pocket. Or put in a slightly different light, the opposition seems to have been blinded by the start potential somewhat like the left was by Obama, and should he ascend to power the opposition is likely to be just as disappointed in him as the left has become with Obama.
Still, Baheyya's points about this throwing the regime off-guard, and the potential to build some opposition constituency with greater success than prior efforts, are certainly there. For all the faults, perhaps there's some real good that can be accomplished. Baheyya's longer-term themes always seem to revolve around the enduring nature of popular opposition in Egypt even if it has trouble winning the big headline successes. My personal annoyance with mini-political-personality-cults aside, perhaps El-Baradei's presumed couple of years in the spotlight can help put some more meat on the bones of the various opposition forces and leave a positive enduring legacy beyond the man. We'll see.
The constitution has to be changed to allow the Atomic Agency man to run. How likely is that? Its a question of whether Egyptians are desperate enough to actually demand of their government to change the constitution. Until that happens, it is pointless to debate his qualities.
Nice:) my brother already told me that, but there is way with using of term paper i would do soon :)