The Egyptian Upper House, Al Shura, has devised a law setting the guidelines for protesting. One skim through and you immediately pronounce it as a law that is meant to be broken.
The first three articles are rhetoric. They give Egyptians the right to protest, define a protest, and set guidelines—enabling protestors to use loudspeakers and banners, for instance. Article Four sets some fair and guiding rules of conduct: protestors should not destroy property, endanger lives, waste people’s time, block traffic, and prohibit people from reaching their destinations and getting to their workplace. This is all good.
Articles Five through Nine are the challenging ones. Article Five states:
Five days before the protest, those calling for the protest should present a written notification to the police station(s) where the protest will take place. It should be delivered personally or by someone who represents the protest organizers.
Often protests are in response to an event or a calamity—to tell protestors to wait five days is highly improbable. It continues:
This notification should include time and date of the protest, when it will end, and the reasons behind it, the route it will take, and the possible number of protestors that will be participating. It should also include the following information on three of the organizers: names, addresses, how to contact them, and signatures.
This incriminates the organizers in advance; any change or unexpected development and the organizers will be accountable. Let's continue:
The Minister of Interior should acknowledge receiving the notification, post the content on the Ministry of Interior’s social media accounts, and notify police stations in the proximity. The minister or his representative should then inform the party protested against to see if there is a way to solve the impasse and evade the protest by having both parties meet before the protest starts.
So, if the protest is against the government, would the government meet with the protestors ahead of time? Highly unlikely.
Article Seven gives the Minister of Interior
. . . the right to strike a committee (in each governorate) to work with the protestors to guarantee citizens’ and private and public establishments’ safety. Committee members including the protest organizers must sign on the minutes of the meeting.
Again this holds them accountable.Then, the organizers become totally responsible for the actions of those demonstrating in all governorates—again, quite ludicrous.
Article Eight and Nine give the Minister of Interior “the right to change the course of the protest, if security warrants such a change, and cancel the protest if not all the demands are fulfilled or that the committee doesn’t reach an agreement with the organizers.”
The law includes over 16 more articles though Articles 5 through 9 are the most conspicuous. A law that organizes protesting is useful, but an explicitly restrictive law encompassing a long-winded process is ineffective. It will be unheeded ultimately turning protestors into lawbreakers. In fact, Egyptians, especially in today’s climate, will react as though the law doesn’t exist.
We know what happens when silly laws are concocted—they are cancelled soon afterwards. Even if they are not cancelled, they are never adhered to.
But let’s consider this from a different perspective. I am with the solid right to protest. No one can take this right from Egyptians. However, as usual Egyptians take things to a far extreme.
Protestors damaged property and burnt cars, threw Molotov and lit tires, attacked one another, and closed off roads and bridges. While some surrounded the homes of the Minister of Interior and the MB leader, others claimed official status and asked to see the ID of Media City employees. While some burnt the FJP Headquarters, others intimidated and victimized. While some drew insolent graffiti on the walls of the presidential palace, others ransacked tents and demolished them. Everyone is faulted.
You recognize that I didn’t identify the culprit or the victim. They are all Egyptians fighting Egyptians. All have erred and blundered.
Don’t get me wrong. President Morsi and his clan have resorted to many inconceivably damaging decisions, which without question aggravated the Egyptians and got them fuming. But the reaction was no better. Egyptians don’t need yet another law; they need a president who can establish order—a president who exudes leadership and demands respect.
It all boils down to who is the power in this country. Logically it should be the president and his government, but when the president and the government goof up, the people decide to be in charge but opt to err.
Back to the new law; it will not come to fruition. Someone is going to tell these intelligent lawmakers that Egyptians will not comply, as they weren’t going to comply with the 10 o’clock bedtime law, which was postponed then annulled. Laws facilitate and direct; they are not written to be broken.
This attitude on the part of the regime and the protestors will take us nowhere.
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