Those who might have cast a vote for the old guard may elect Ahmed Shafik, the last Prime Minister appointed by the deposed Hosni Mubarak, who now says that he will appoint three Vice Presidents, one of whom is a woman and one is a Copt, or the less tainted figure Amr Moussa, the former head of the Arab League and who had a vast political experience. Other less known and more radical secularists are also running.
The Muslim Brothers had a back-up nominee to the charismatic wealthy Mr. Shater. That is Mohamed Morsy who is nowhere as effective, well financed or widely known as Mr. Shater. However, he became instantly one of the front runners. Abd-ElMoneim Abolfotoh is another one among the known few. He had a testy relationship with the leadership of the Muslim Brothers, was ousted from that party and is now endorsed by Mr. El-Baradei (the Nobel Laureate, previous head of the Atomic Agency and law Professor in Vienna).
Equalization is human; we can tear those better than us or we can raise ourselves to their level. Destruction is much easier than building. The Egyptian Military will fight to keep its privileges that were acquired through centuries of Military rule. If we let the other political factions fight with SCAF everyone will lose and Egypt will end up being worse off. If we allow the military to keep its current advantages (except for issues that clearly have no military use such as chicken farms or olive oil factories), and instead of that focus our attention to improve the lives of the rest of the citizens everyone will benefit and Egypt will be the ultimate winner. So let us not be driven by vengeance or by exacting revenge from those who abused their powers but build a new Egypt that will serve the deprived and that all of us will be proud of.
In his new book titled “Heaven on Earth”, the British author Sadakat Kadri recites how after the death of the prophet Muhammad in 632, there was no such thing as Shariah law for 400 years and it was God’s job to judge all people. Kadri (who is a Muslim) writes that a subsequent invention and that “Any assessment of this vast legal territory runs the risk of being either unrepresentative or tediously comprehensive”. He argues that Islam intended for the different legal issues to be settled in the court rooms, and I agree. Kadri argues that such abuses of the role of Islam, albeit recent, can be dangerous and devastating. He concludes by saying that Muslims today are no less capable of accommodating new expectations of fairness and compassion than their ancestors. This is certainly the view that I espouse and is not applied in practice. Furthermore, in another recent book “The Wave: Man, God and the Ballot Box in the Middle East” Reuel Marc Gerecht argues that Muslims cannot be dragged to an embrace of secularism and the liberal values that spring from it. Some traditions will persist for some time. These include the exclusion of Christians and women from certain positions, forced marriages, marrying young girls and clitoridectomy. He underscores the fact, and I concur, that they have to arrive voluntarily at the understanding of the values of real democracy.
Copts have to participate in this brighter tomorrow by coalescing around the one candidate who promises to right the direction of the Egyptian ship. Yes, it will take several generations to cure the multiple ills of the Egyptian society (and the other predominantly Muslim countries) but being passive and waiting for the inevitable to happen is not a recipe for progress. People running for President of Egypt can say anything to get elected, but the best predictor of future actions is past behavior
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Dr Basta is a professor at a San Francisco University and was Professor of Medicine and Director of the Division of Cardiology at the University of South Florida College of Medicine. He was section editor of medical ethics and Member of the Editorial Board of the American Journal of Geriatric Cardiology.
