At Marxism 2013 - Contributions

I attended workshops on women's and queer liberation at Marxism 2013. Both workshops were given in-depth presentations on Marxist understandings of gender and liberation, followed by a thorough, ranging and generally comradely discussion afterwards. These are notes from two contributions I drafted on my phone before I spoke (the latter I got to give in the session), which I have slightly polished.

From Gender Construction and Capitalism

A comrade raised concerns about the attitudes towards trans* people and one particular contribution which got quite crudely biological about it. I agree, and I think that this was an issue I felt wasn't addressed enough; several comrades also repeatedly used the phrase of "same sex marriage". This is the kind of demand the Tories, Clover Moore & Alex Greenwhich can support; what we should remember we are fighting for is equal marriage, inclusive of all gender identities.

Recently we've seen footballer Robbie Rogers publicly come out shortly after retiring from Leeds - something that the progressive sporting world certainly should take note of, given the role sport plays as a bastion of reinforcing gender identities. The last footballer to do so committed suicide shortly after, alienated from the football community. Robbie has stated that he needed to step away from the sport to do so, but the fact that he felt he could now do so and seems to be recieving much more positive support for it, to me, reflects that something has changed since the turn of the millenium - and the most obvious answer is the equal marriage movement, which has totally shifted public opinion in Australia and overseas.

This is why independent movements of both lgbti people & women is so crucial to ensure we begin to challenge oppression now; the effect that victories, or even just higher levels of struggle, has on popular consciousness is significant, even if it feels as activists we're shouting into the wind.

Most people in the room seem to have different ways of putting it when it comes to feminism, current tasks or demands to emphasise, and I have an opinion on those things, but I think there is common enough opinions amongst socialist that could forms a basis for united work - against the oppression of women today, seeking to win demands like equal pay, reproductive rights or others, in the same way that we have worked together in the equal marriage movement.

From Festivals of the Oppressed - Women in Revolutions from Russia to Egypt.

I think it's a very pertinent topic to consider and thank Julia for the talk. I think we can all agree that so long as we live in a society based on class oppression then we cannot talk about full liberation for anyone.

To build on what Julia raised about how struggle inspires women to find a greater courage and dedication even than many leading male revolutionaries - Michael Lebowitz said in Socialism for the 21st century:

Rather, we change only through real practice, by changing circumstances ourselves. Marx’s concept of “revolutionary practice”, that concept of “the coincidence of the changing of circumstances and of human activity or self-change’, is the red thread that runs throughout his work.

This is very true for the process of struggle, particularly at revolutionary peaks, undermining sexist ideas, and other ideologies underpinning oppression. Julia identified women's oppression is a barrier to women getting involved in the class struggle already. I think this means if we want all people to be involved in our movement we should struggle against women's oppression and to challenge sexist ideas and behaviours today - the muck of the ages.

This us a big challenge for the revolutionary movements in the Arab world. Julia mentioned that women have played a key role in protests in Tahrir, leading the chants in the square - this was certainly my experience, even in November still the case!

Tahrir Square, 27/11/11

But women and men have also had to challenge sexual assault in Tahrir; there have been many documented cases of assault against women since January 25, by both by forces of the state and others in the street, and that's an ongoing struggle which has come to the fore again today. But the overall success of revolutionary struggle has meant that independent feminist struggle has grown massively since the downfall of Ben Ali and Mubarak.

A key example is the struggle over the constitution in Tunisia - feminist activists led struggle against a constitutional reform being proposed by Nahda which would define women as "complimentary" to men.. That particular struggle has been a key component, along with union struggle in both cities and interior regions, of rebuilding class struggle to the point where it is now - arguably at a higher level than when Ben Ali was overgrown. The lesson is that independent womens struggle is key, not only for the class struggle as a whole but also building a movement to challenge oppression today and lead to a society where we can be rid of it.

Egypt: Morsi Sworn In Before Regime's Court

Submitted for publication to Green Left Weekly.

The Muslim Brotherhood candidate for Egypt's Presidential Elections, Mohamed Morsi, was sworn into office on July 30, after the Electoral Comission announced on June 24 that he had beaten ex-regime candidate Ahmed Shafiq with 51.7% of the vote.

Morsi sworn in before High Constitutional Court. Photo: Xinhua

Significantly, Morsi swore the oath before Egypt's High Consitutional Court (HCC) – which on June 14 declared the law regulating the 2011 parliamentary elections, in which the Muslim Brotherhood won close to half of all seats, unconstitutional.

Egypt's Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF), which had exercised presidential powers after Hosni Mubarak's resignation, then dissolved the Parliament on June 17 with a supplementary Constitutional Declaration that also gave itself several Presidential powers and oversights.

This includes power to dissolve and appoint the constituent assembly elected by parliament to draft a new constitution.

The conformation of Morsi's win, however, was overshadowed by protests and sit-ins at Cairo's iconic Tahrir Square and elsewhere around the country, demanding the parliament be restored and the supplementary Constitution Declaration be revoked.

The Muslim Brotherhood called on its supporters to join the protests on Friday June 22, demanding the military respect Morsi's win.

However, Judge Tahani El-Gebaly, a member of the HCC, insisted in comments to al-Ahram newspaper that Morsi was bound to accept the addendum after taking oath before the court.

An AFP report quoted Morsi as saying there would be "no Islamisation of state institutions" during his Presidency, while the Herald Sun reported his vision of Egypt was as a "democratic, modern and constitutional state".

He also stated that he would "stand with the Palestinian people until they regain all their rights" – however, the supplementary Constitutional Declaration also declared the SCAF has sole authority over military matters and is the only body which can declare a state of war.

Egypt's military receives billions of dollars of aid from the US government annually; a key concern of American commentators has been the potential of the new regime to break the 1979 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, brokered at Camp David.

After taking office, Morsi began accepting protesters into his office to hear their grievances. On July 4 it was announced a group of public-sector teachers demanding permanent full-time contracts who had been protesting had their demands granted by Morsi. In response, Al-Ahram ran the headline: "The people know the way to the palace"

However, protesters demanding an end to military trials of civilians and the release of political prisoners were prevented from entering, reported Al Arabiya on July 4.

The demands of Tahrir - for democratisation, equality before the law, putting regime figures on trial - are still being fought tooth and nail by the regime. Yet the independant worker's movement seems to be winning far more sympathy amongst the population - and, as such, presenting far more of a threat to the "new" regime.

General Adel Al-Morsi, head of the Military Judiciary Authority, was reported Daily News Egypt as saying that no ‘political prisoners’ are facing military trials, only 'criminals'. He also said responsibility lay with the President to pardon any charged by military courts.

Morsi, who officially resigned from the Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party after election results were announced, called for supporters to take to Tahrir on June 29 for the "Friday of the transfer of power". Protesters chanted "Down with the power of the military," reported AFP.

However, Egypt Independant reported on July 2 that Mostafa al-Ghoneimy, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Guidance Bureau, announced they would no longer be supporting the Tahrir sit-in.

Sayed al-Nazily, a member of the Brotherhood Shura Council, said members were instructed to continue the sit-in until a July 9 challenge to the ruling which dissolved parliament.

Ahram Online's Yasmine Wali reported on July 3 that the Square was almost empty, with only a handful of Brotherhood supporters remaining. Other activist groups such as the April 6 Youth Movement also suspended their involvement in Tahrir.

As the struggle between the SCAF and Morsi for control of the state apparatus unfolds, it seems clear that, despite the hopes of many, Tahrir's revolutionaries will still need to take to the streets to win their demands.

Egypt: Brotherhood claim presidential win amid big street protests

This was orginally published in Green Left Weekly here, going to print on June 24 shortly before Morsi's victory was announced. Stay posted for another update on his swearing in, the Brotherhood's withdrawal from Tahrir, and the military's advances.

[Although official results are yet to be announced, it seems] Muhammad Morsi, the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood (MB) candidate, has won the second round of Egypt's presidential elections, held on June 16-17.

However, his opponent, ex-regime candidate Ahmed Shafik, also declared victory on election night, claiming there was no way Morsi had secured the million-vote lead their camp claimed.

Election Contest

In the lead-up to the second round of voting, several prominent left forces, including the Revolutionary Socialists and the April 6 Youth Movement, declared their support for Morsi's campaign.

In a statement on May 28, the Revolutionary Socialists described Shafiq as the "face of the counter-revolution", and without a candidate standing for the Tahrir revolution, called for all supporters of the January 25 revolution to unite behind Morsi.

The statement attributed Shafiq's success to "the smear campaigns, systematic repression and intimidation of the social and popular forces "

An independant election monitor supported by Middle East Voices substantiated Morsi's claim of  leading with around 51.8% of the vote. (the final count was 51.7% Morsi)

Much of the attention from the elections, however, was taken up with the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF)'s maneuvers to limit the power of the winner.

Military Declares Power

After the Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC) ruled on June 14 that the Parliamentary Election Law regulating the 2011 elections was unconstitutional, the SCAF issued a decree dissolving the Islamist-majority parliament on June 17, shortly after the presidential polls had closed.

The day before the ruling, the Justice Ministry had also decreed that military police and intelligence officers could arrest civilians, continuing the legacy of the state of emergency, which legally ended at the start of June.

Al Jazeera English quoted Mohamed Beltagy, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, as describing the decree as a "military coup" which had not been discussed in Parliament.

On June 17, Ahram Online reported Saad El-Katatni, speaker of the Parliament, as having told the SCAF he would continue to convene the body despite its dissolution.

The SCAF has also issued a "supplementary constitutional declaration" seizing many Presidential powers for the council itself.

Armed forces were deployed in great numbers across Egypt ahead of the announcement of official results – originally scheduled for June 21.

Amr Ahmed, from the Egyptian Socialist Party, told Green Left Weekly: "There are four main points to the declaration.

Firstly, that the SCAF are the only ones responsible for everything relating to the military, the appointment of leadership, and [Field Marshall] Tantawi is to hold the power of Commander in Chief and Secretary of Defence

Second, that the SCAF must approve any declaration of a state of war.

Thirdly, the SCAF will hold the authority of Parliament until a new one can be elected.

Fourth, the SCAF will control the body to draft a new constitution within 3 months, to be approved by a referendum after that.

So at present you can see the SCAF will remain in the scene regardless of who is the president.... they will be like a marionette in the hands of the military."

Responses

The US government has signalled concerns with the situation. Hilary Clinton responded to the declarations with a statement on June 14 calling for the military authorities to "fully transfer power to a democratically elected civilian government as planned", reported Ahram Online.

However, the role of the US has been far from helpful to the transition to democratic rule in Egypt. In fact, in March Clinton waived the requirement  for certification of basic human rights conditions in the country before the United States' $1.3 US billion of aid to Egypt could be released, reported the New York Times on March 26.

The Guardian reported that Egypt's benchmark index dropped 1.9% in the early hours of Monday morning, on the back of the expected win of Morsi and the military maneuvers.

Initial protests at the dissolution of parliament drew thousands to the street on June 15. Then on June 18, a joint statement was issued by a variety of left forces to "Announce [the signatories'] complete rejection of the Supplementary Constitutional Declaration."

The statement called for the president-elect to reject the Supplementary Declaration, cancel exceptional measures issued by the SCAF and refuse to take the oath of office before the SCC. (ed: Morsi did take the oath before the SCC, which I write about in my following article)

The statement called for a protest in Tahrir Square on Tuesday June 19; tens of thousands responded, rallying through the night.

The Muslim Brotherhood called for its supporters to join the protests throughout the week, launching its own vigils in public squares throughout the country against the "coup".

Ahmed told Green Left Weekly: "What's happening now has nothing to do with the goals of the revolution or the people, but is part of the ongoing conflict between the SCAF and the Muslim Brotherhood for power and influence in the state."

Where to for the Revolution?

Since the first-round elections, when all candidates reflecting the demands of the revolution were defeated, Egypt's revolutionary camp has been split on how to approach the electoral processes and the political sphere.

One important chapter for breaking people's illusions in the Muslim Brotherhood is the question of sexism and sexual harrassment, which was brought to the fore in December when footage of a female protester being beaten and stripped half-naked in Tahrir by soldiers spread online.

Ahmed said: "On this issue there is no conflict between the SCAF and the MB. The Brotherhood said that it was the fault of the protester for being in Tahrir Square that this happened to her."

"The illusion of fundamental differences between the MB and the SCAF will become more and more apparent over time."

Where to for Tahrir?

The "leaderless" approach of the Tahrir revolutionaries, uniting around basic demands for democratic and economic reforms, has been a factor in the lack of significant wins in the political sphere for the demands of the revolution beyond the winning of electoral process and the trial of Mubarak.

"We have pushed to take some advancements and achievements, but they have all been taken up by the Brotherhood", Ahmed told GLW.

"We need to create a third power, an organisation of the revolution, to represent its agenda & goals, and lead people towards the revolution's milestones."

"The Egyptian Socialist Party is seeking to create this third political force with other figures on the left – such as Sabahy and El Baradei – that can represent the revolution."

Writing on her blog Tahrir & Beyond on June 17, Gigi Ibrahim, a leading member of Egypt's Revolutionary Socialists, declared: "the revolution has no machine, no organised group, no political party sufficient enough to adopt the revolution's goals and capable of fighting the two most organised and biggest threatening machines to the revolution, the NDP (Mubarak's party) and MB, and the SCAF"

Throughout the struggles around the elections, the workers' movement has continued to push for economic & political reforms in workplaces across Egypt.

Public Transport workers in Cairo went on strike for two weeks in March, demanding the removal of corrupt Mubarak-era officials as well as a bonus equal to 100 weeks pay.

On March 27 they went back to work, winning their demands for improved pay and conditions.

The strong showing of Hamdeen Sabahy, who put forward a Nasserist platform of expanding subsidies and state investment, and polled a close third behind Shafik in the first round of the presidential elections, shows that the prospects for building on the demands of workers and democracy activists in the political sphere are good.

The question is – will they find the vehicle to exercise their own power? Or will the mauevering between the SCAF & MB stagnate the January 25 revolution?

Egypt: Streets erupt as court dissolves parliament in 'coup'

This piece was finished shortly before polls opened in last weekend's Egyptian Presidential elections, which it now seems the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate Muhammad Morsi, who revolutionary groups such as the April 6 Youth Movement and the Revolutionary Socialists backed, has announced his victory in. Official results will be announced Thursday. Stay posted for more in-depth coverage. Originally published at Green Left Weekly.

Monday, June 18, 2012

Egypt's second-round presidential elections between ex-regime figure Ahmed Shafiq and Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsi will go ahead after the High Constitutional Court (HCC) ruled on June 14 that Shafiq's candidacy was constitutional.

The ruling declared that the Political Disenfanchisement Law, which barred ex-members of Mubarak's National Democratic Party (NDP) from holding high government offices, was unconstitional.

In what came as a shock to many, the HCC also said Egypt's Parliamentary Elections Law, which had regulated last year's parliamentary elections, was unconstitutional, dissolving the lower house People's Assembly.

The elections last year brought the Muslim Brotherhood to the fore and, combined with the Salafist al-Nour party, gave the Islamists a majority. Morsi, the Brotherhood's candidate in the presidential elections, led the first round of voting over May 23-24.

But Ziad Bahaa-Eldin, a legislator from the Social Democratic Party, said Egypt's electoral law was "flawed and brought in a flawed parliament," Reuters reported on June 15.

"Parliament had lost much of its stature and credibility ... because of the Islamist parties' misuse of the majority they enjoyed."

But many activists have called the moves a "coup". Enjy Hamdy, from the leading activist organisation the April 6 Youth Movement (A6YM), said: "This all must be seen as a military coup, an attempt by the army to stay in power longer to protect their interests, which we will not accept."

First-round candidate Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh also called the results "an obvious military coup", reported Bikya Masr.

The Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF), who have retained presidential powers since Mubarak was ousted on February 11 last year, has blamed ongoing protests and struggles for democratic reform on "foreign hands", while refusing popular calls to relinquish their authority to a civilian "salvation council" to oversee Egypt's elections.

Ahram Online reporter Wael Eskaner tweeted in response to the ruling: "It's not true that Egyptians aren't ready for democracy, it's the Egyptian regime that isn't."

Angry protests were launched around the country after the results. Two thousand protesters marched from Mohandeseen to Tahrir Square in Cairo on June 15 in a protest called by the Revolutionary Socialists, A6YM and others, Ahram Online said.

However, despite thousands taking to Tahrir Square, street protests did not reach the critical mass needed to shut down the city.

Ahram Online's reporter said marchers tore down and defaced campaign posters for Shafiq. Immediately after the results images becan circulating social media of protesters stamping on Shafiq's posters or hitting them with shoes.

Despite the protests, the presidential run-off was set to go ahead at the weekend of June 16-17.

Arab Spring Meeting Notes #4 - What We Aren't Being Told

This is the fourth in my series of meeting talk notes, which started here. Feel free to use these in whatever way, and let me know if there's anything I've gotten wrong or missed out on important pieces of the puzzle.

I've got 10 minutes, which is not enough time to talk about full history of the Arab Spring, and not even really enough time to talk about my experiences in the region in any depth. Instead, I want to highlight the key things that we aren’t being told about the Arab uprisings by the powers that be. I feel they help us to see the most important things about this period of struggle.

One is what these uprisings were about – this is the first and foremost western media distortion, that the youth of the Arab world just wanted the West’s liberal democratic rights to go with their iPhones. This is lmost completely untrue.

The Arab Spring began with immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in the city of Sidi Bouzid, in Tunisia's underdeveloped interior which had suffered under the IMF policy splitting the country up into three economic zones based on how easy it was to get goods from those areas to the ports. His situation was created not just by police intimidation, but by the political repression going hand in hand with the economics of third world neocolonialism.

The first few days of wild protests throughout the interior region, especially in the mining cities like Ghasserine, Gafsa, etc which had previously risen up in 08, were not "Facebook" revolutions – which is another western media mistruth. But the internet did prove hugely important - several brave bloggers, inc Slim Amamou and Azyz Amami of the Tunisian Pirate Party & Lina Ben Mhenni of Tunisian Girl / nearly nobel prize fame travelled out to the region rising up, documented bodies in hospital, and spread word to the networks of activists in the big coastal cities of Sfax, Sousse, Tunis; the first two got arrested for this.

So the internet was a tool, but if there weren’t a layer of youth in the region that had been radicalised by a decade of growing struggle – student activism, democratic activism like the 05 election campaign in Egypt, the mini uprisings of 2008 in Egypt & Tunisia – a layer of youth ready to fight the regime in Sidi Bouzid, then these revolutions wouldn’t have happened just because there was Twitter or Facebook.

In fact, when I visited Tahrir square between September and November of last year, the majority of protesters there didn’t even have smart phones. Certainly there are some better-off students and others who are part of the movement who do, but the vast majority of the protesters come from the urban poor population.

The street protests of the January 25 uprising in Egypt were called online by the April 6 Youth Movement and We Are All Khaled Said, inspired by Ben Ali's downfall in Tunisia but responding to the growing anger over the death of Khaled Said in June of 2010, drew the biggest numbers of any protest in 50 years - tens of thousands. However this only took on critical mass after the police attacked Tahrir square and broke up the protests; bridges, main routes were all occupied by police, so many activists took refuge in the homes in neighbouring suburbs - and ordinary people with no access to internet, only state TV, who had heard about and were excited about but unsure of the protests, were won over. On the 28th, there were hundreds of thousands in Tahrir. Those kinds of numbers, combined with a general strike in the second week of Feb, forced the military regime to abandon their support for the figurehead of Mubarak as the elites of Tunisia had done with Ben Ali only weeks earlier.

The fact that these revolutions were as much about demands for a change in economic policies as political freedoms can be seen from the importance of the involvement of the urban & rural poor, and also from the fact that an essential component of them has been labour activity – strikes across private & public sector industries. This is something the western media also consistently fails to mention – as it did for the four years prior to them while strikes and labour protests exploded across the region. And workers continue to press for economic justice. Some Egyptian hospitals have been taken over by the doctors, nurses and caretakers and are being run democratically. In every level, workers are winning demands for better pay, conditions, more democracy at work and to get rid of Mubarak & Ben-Ali-era cronies. How? Not by accepting the power of the new parliament, but by struggling for it themselves.

This brings us onto the next western media angle, also adopted by the post-dictator governments: that the uprisings were great, they won their demands for an elected parliament, now there’s some instability but it’s time the people of the region to get back to work and get on with building their country. This is consistently the attitude of not only the Western press but also our politicians and those of the successor regimes in the middle-east, so it’s perhaps the most crucial mistruth to see through.

When I bumped into her by chance in a café in Tunis where lefty blogger types tend to congregate, Lina Ben Mhenni summed up the most salient response to this that I've heard when she said:

“The revolution did not finish on January 14 (the day Ben Ali was overthrown) — it started on January 14! Ben Ali left the country, but he is just the head of the system.

Every day I am more and more convinced that the whole system is still there. The police are back to committing violence, there are more and more limitations on freedom of speech.

The media is still manipulated by government and political parties — and bloggers and cyber activists continue to play that role of citizen journalists.”

The fact that there has been relatively free elections in Tunisia & Egypt (in some ways even more free in Tunisia than here in Australia – with strictly regulated media & public advertising equally set aside for each candidate) and in lots of other countries through the region in response to the uprisings is a big win for the revolutionary movements. But these revolutionary movements are far from fulfilled. The fundamental economic questions, and even the fundamental political ones, remain to be addressed. The newly elected regimes of Egypt & Tunisia, comprised of Islamist majorities working with “liberal” pro-capitalist forces – ie those who had money or influence before the uprisings began – have both committed to the neoliberal Washington consensus of more IMF loans conditional on restructuring, privatisation, ending subsidies sharpening inequality, etc. They’ve both re-affirmed their roles as team players in the regional geopolitical status, against the wishes of their people – as can be seen from the protests which stormed the Israeli embassy in Egypt on September 9 (again an angle; the major protests in Tahrir, at courts and govt offices earlier in the day were ignored in the mainstream reportage). So the heads have changed, their base of power may have shifted, but there has been little real change; as such, the revolutionary movements are still growing, and still fighting.

Some of the wins of the Arab Spring, though, can be seen in other things; the upsurge in women’s rights activism in Tunisia, for example, or community organisation amongst the poorer villages, suburbs and informal slums surrounding Cairo. These struggles going forward, whether again the government or on different issues like feminism or solidarity organised with those suffering in the frozen interior in Tunisia through the winter, are coming out of the fact that there is a huge new layer of young, inspired, revolutionary youth, who are debating politics in the cafes and streets, and who are convinced they can change the world

The responsibility of us as people wanting a better world here in the west is primarily to learn from the Arab Spring, and secondarily to show solidarity to it. Above all, we should take the spirit which has come to define the era of the Arab Spring – that another world is possible, an alternative to this system is possible, if we fight for it – and make it a reality here in Australia.

"An act of political thuggery, not a matter of law and order" - Interview with Austin Mackell

Austin Mackell (of The Moon Under Water) is an Australian journalist based in Cairo who reports on Egyptian politics, the labour movement and life on the street. In February he was arrested in the city of Mahalla el-Kubra while reported on an attempted general strike of workers. I spoke to Austin on the 30th of May; this interview will appear in Green Left Weekly.

What are the latest developments with the Presidential elections – what do the first round results show, and is it clear who will be contesting the second round?

The first round of the elections show that the Muslim Brotherhood and the remnants of the old regime, the felool, are still able to out-compete the revolutionaries in terms of an electoral process.

The winner by a small margin was the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate, Mohamed Morsi, and second was Ahmed Shafik, who was Prime Minister under Mubarak appointed at the very last minute of his regime's life. It looks now like the final race will be between those two candidates, which is a huge disappointment for the revolutionaries.

There was a left-wing secular candidate called Hamdi Sabahi, who was written off by many people as an outside because he didn't have the resources and infrastructure many of the other candidates had – he came in third. Considering that he was also competing for the vote with Abul Fotouh, an Islamist who had split from the Brotherhood towards the moderate side who was also considered a revolutionary candidate – those two between them, if they'd had a combined revolutionary vote they would have had a clear lead.

Of course many of the revolutionaries boycotted the first round. I wonder if they are questioning that seeing how close Sabahi came to winning it.

Secondly, now there's a much stronger call for a boycott as well, since it's the Muslim Brotherhood versus the old regime. There's been some controvery over some revolutionaries saying to back the Muslim brotherhood because at least they aren't from the old dictatorship, while others are saying no, they already have control of the parliament, handing them control of the presidency as well would be handing over too much control at the formative stage. In any case, most revolutionaries, in terms of people who have been active on the streets, are still saying the street is where the battle has to happen for the next few years – that's the position of the April 6 youth movement. That's why they didn't contest the elections, they say that you don't have elections during a revolutionary phase, the revolution has to be more complete.

Who is exactly is Hamdi Sabahi? What does he stand for?

Sabahi is the founder of the Dignity party; he was an MP under President Mubarak, he won a seat in 2005, though he's credited as being one of the few voices of resistance in that parliament asides from the Brotherhood. He really ran as the poor man's candidate. His party is Nasserist; carrying on the spirit of pan-arab socialism would be his root ideology, although it's moderated and the message is much more populist and nasserist than ideological

How widely was the boycott observed?

It's hard to know how widely it was observed; it's clear that the turnout was lower than the parliamentary election, which some revolutionaries have called a victory because it means the population is losing faith in SCAF's electoral process. But you could also make the argument that that was simply the result of the Salafi candidate Abbou Ismael being disqualified ahead of the poll. Because the Salafists didn't have a candidate to vote for – some voted for Abol Fotouh, or for Morsi, but you can imagine a lot of them were a lot less motivated to vote not having a major Salafi candidate on the ballot. This would also explain why there was what's been considered a majority secular vote, if you add up Sabahi, Shafik and Amr Moussa, the former foreign minister, which people have been using to say Egyptians have turned to secular candidates. But you can question that because the Salafis may have been sitting out as well.

That has probably been a bigger boycott (although it may not have been phrased that way) than the active calls for a boycott from Tahrir Square and the revolutionary youth networks around it. However, that being said, now that it's a race between Morsi and Shafik you might see a much bigger boycott in the second round.

What is the situation with Tahrir Square and the revolutionary layer? Is the Square still occupied?

There's basically a constant occupation now in Tahrir Square with people protesting – earlier today they had at least a few hundred there protesting due to allegations of fraud by Shafik. In fact, there's been reports of fraud by both Shafik and Moussa as well as the Brotherhood by April 6 and various news outlets as well. But the general impression is that there was a lot of small irregularities but not necessarily enough to have influenced the vote. It doesn't mean there was a concerted plan to rig the campaigns, but perhaps just the kind of dirty campaigning you see everywhere.

Some people are protesting of that – a lot of them, Sabahi's supporters – but the Square's been pretty much permanently occupied since the clashes of the Occupy Cabinet incident in early December. All throughout 2011 there was an ongoing struggle for physical control of the Square, and now it seems the army and the police have pretty much given up on it. The protesters were allowed to keep the central island with tents, as well as the space in front of the central administrative building the Mogamma.

So the revolutionary youth won that space in those clashes, and actually now we've seen the latest clashes taking place outside the ministry of defence, which occured just before the elections. There were numbers of Salafis demonstrating because their candidate Abbou Ismael had been disqualified, actually on the basis that his mother was an American citizen – which some were disputing, claiming there's a conspiracy against him, etc etc.

Either way his supporters went down to protest the decision at the electoral commission, and they were joined by secular supporters and opponents of the SCAF as well; there were 11 deaths reported there, in the final week before the election. There is still definitely real tension on the streets and the possibility of more of these battles – particularly if Shafik wins, I might add.

I should add that the significance of protest moving to the MOD is that the protesters are moving more into more confrontation – we've got Tahrir now and that's great, now let's move on the next seat of power, seems to be the idea.

Is the Brotherhood taking out the presidential election likely to change the balance of power or weaken SCAF's hold over the country?

That's very difficult to know – it's certainly going to change the balance of power. What the relationship between the brotherhood and the military will be like and how it'll evolve is really difficult to know. People are talking about some kind of deal being made between the Brotherhood and the SCAF – there's probably been all kinds of deals made, but I don't think that there's a marriage between the two about to take place where we see them unite as the stable new elite, although something like that may evolve. Really we're in a period when making predictions is a good way to look stupid; if you look at the polling during the last election votes fluctuated wildly in the days before the elections. Things are really in flux here, there aren't established political forces like we're used to dealing with in Australia. There is the brotherhood and there is the military but there's this huge chaotic force at work in the political sphere as well of the revolution.

How has the labour movement related to the elections?

The one thing that was clear after the parliamentary elections was that until now the labour movement as a whole hadn't emerged on scene as any sort of political force. But with the emergence of Sabahi as such a strong candidate, there's certainly evidence that this is on the cards in the future. This was a suprise to many here, including people like me with an interest in the labour movement, as we didn't see anything like this gaining support in the parliamentary elections – but there's clearly an affinity for labour in Sabahi's platform, in what he's standing for. We don't know how real that would be if he got into power, of course. His candidacy underlines the new dynamics which are starting to emerge – there are the candidates like Moussa and Shafik, whose primary qualifications are having served in the old regime, and whose popularity has its own reasons like name recognition – but if you remove them from the equation you have the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic conservatism on the right and then Arab nationalism on the left, and then you have a candidate like Abol Fotouh in the middle who is some kind of mix of all of those. So this is a political spectrum very similar to ours – although with such population and poverty in Egypt there's a lot more space for leftward movement, which is exciting.

Did any radical left forces make a decent showing in the results?

That depends how you define "radical" – there was Khaled Ali, who was seen as the revolution's candidate. How radical his rhetoric exactly would be I'm not clear on – I haven't seen many of his speeches translated – but my impression is he's been seen as the candidate of the revolutionary youth, so radical in that sence, although certainly not as far to the left as the Revolutionary Socialists, who didn't field a candidate, and who now have gained a lot of ire for their leadership figures suggesting Morsi should be backed to prevent the return of old leadership.

But the candidate on the left of note was Sabahi – and his platform was significantly to the left. The difference between Sabahi and Shafik or Moussa was much bigger than the difference between major left and right candidates in any western elections, so the revolutionary situation has already opened up more democratic space than we already have in the west. His platform was explicitly about wealth redistribution; instead of following the line being tossed around by the IMF for cutting or "targetting" subsidies, he's talking about the need to expand subsidies and providing more services. His success has come as a surprise, and it changes the political landscape. Of course the success of Shafik and Morsi were also suprises and much more unpleasant ones.

What is the latest with your case? Has the regime indicated if they are going to press the charges?

We're still not clear whether we'll be taken to court or not; what we've got are preliminary charges – the Egyptian legal system is modelled on the French, so it doesn't really mirror Australia's. The charges are with the prosecutor's office, who is then meant to decide whether it goes to court or the case is archived. That's been the case for the last 3 months, and there hasn't been any real progress – we've heard of paper moving from one office to another, so we don't know when to expect any resolution.

Are you free to travel and report?

To an extent – my passport was taken when I was arrested, and it's being held along with my laptop and camera and other stuff, so it makes it quite difficult to move around. In the initial period after my arrest I was quite nervous when moving around of being recognised in the street as the spy from TV; I was kicked out my apartment and my neighbourhood has sort-of turned against me after our story was flashed on state TV. It's already been made quite difficult for journalists in general, foreign journalists in particular, by virtue of all of the media about foreign conspirators and such. And if I were in the situation where I had to explain myself to a large group of people why I don't have my passport, what I'm doing, etc etc – it's a situation which might complicate things with the case. But the main thing is that I'm not allowed to leave the country while this is going on – I can't travel home to Australia or anywhere else, which is an inconvenience. But there's a veiled threat in all of this; we're very confident we would win if the case went to court, but however improbable it is, this notion of 5 to 7 years sentence is in the back of your mind; it makes it hard to live a normal life, let alone work or move around.

What do you have to say to Bob Carr and the Australian government?

I wish Bob Carr would take a more active interest in the case. He's been very standoffish and hasn't responded to any of my friends, family or supporters – even through the union, I was only able to get what looked like a form letter our of him saying they can't interfere with the Egyptian legal process. On the other hand, the motion introduced by Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon to the Senate was passed calling on the Australian government to ensure due process was followed. I don't know how much information Bob Carr has about the case; you at Green Left probably are quite aware that what is happening is anything but due process. From the beginning this is an act of political thuggery, not a matter of law an order. The Australian government should have the gonads to speak out on that, as it should have for all of the human rights abuses committed by the Egyptian forces and all of the remnants of the old regime. But there's a silence on that, as there is on so many other issues, because Washington says to be quiet about it, so we do.

My case is nothing compared to what happened to people like David Hicks or Mamdouh Habib. Habib was brought to Egypt – he didn't come here of his own free will but was "rendered" or kidnapped here, and tortured for 6 months. He has alleged the Australian government was complicit in that, and they certainly still haven't cleared their name of that. You can see that today with the case of Julian Assange, or with our case here – the government certainly doesn't hold the rights of it's citizens as its first priority.

Arab Spring Meeting Notes #2 - Learning from the Arab Spring

This is the second post of notes from talks that I have given on the Arab Spring. This one includes both Tunisia and Egypt, looking at the broader class dynamics at play a little bit, and some initial ideas on where to for the revolutionary movements. Discussion, constructive criticism and correction of any errors is welcomed.

Bringing the Global Revolt to Australia - Learning from the Arab Spring

I'm Patrick Harrison, I'm an activist with Resistance & the Socialist Alliance. Last year I travelled to Egypt, Tunisia & Palestine, in part to try and meet with revolutionary activists in those countries and to document the unfolding revolutionary processes, as well as to correspond for Green Left Weekly.

Another GLW journalist who writes on the region, Tony Iltis, said in a recent Socialist Alliance forum that the primary responsibility of activists in the West is to understand the Arab Spring in order to learn from it, then secondarily to show solidarity with it. Maybe we don't have unelected dictators committing major atrocities against their people here in Australia, yet the chapter in the MENA region's history being called the Arab Spring shows a lot about the functioning of the global political & economic systems – and what it takes to change them.

Background

Western politicians and the media love to talk about the Arab Spring as though it was this thing that came from nowhere and nobody could have predicted it. Yet when Mohammed Bouazizi doused himself with petrol in front of a police station on December 17, 2010, it was the final straw for many of those suffering under oppressive police states across the region. Decades of neoliberal economic reforms and spiralling oil prices since 2001 had been making life harder and harder for the vast majority living in the Arab world. This situation, this pressure, saw a variety of expressions over the first decade of this century. There were officially sanctioned demonstrations in 2000-1 in solidarity with the Palestinian Intifada, which brought street politics back to the region where it for the main part had been forced underground throughout the 90s. These protests were the first for a new layer of young people who'd spent their whole lives living under the dictatorship.

However, when these young Egyptians and veteran leftists started campaigning for democratic reforms in 2004, forming the Egyptian movement for change (or "Kefaya", enough), they began to face major harrasment from the regime. This came to a head in 2005, with the Mubarak regime organising a referendum approving constitutional changes allowing for multi-party elections while still ensuring the process was entirely sewn up by his National Democratic Party (NDP). Despite a strong grassroots campaign, Kefaya, as part of the National Front for Change coalition, only won 12 seats, with the NDP holding a super-majority of 388 seats and the Muslim Brotherhood winning 88. This reflected an important dynamic of this decade, which evolved out of imperialist interventions in the late 20th century; perhaps the majority of the population in most of the region, or at least a large section, saw political Islam, in one form or another, as the natural opposition to the pro-capitalist pro-Western pro-war on Terror regimes. It's worth noting that, of all the region's countries, this support for political islam movements was perhaps weakest in Tunisia.

After this experience of struggle, and with the worsening of unemployment, poverty & other social conditions, a large layer of Arab youth & workers became increasingly radicalised. This energy led to a growth in activism in a variety of areas; most significantly, some of the networks of leftists which existed, either underground as in Egypt or hiding as low-level activists within the regime-sanctioned trade unions as in Tunisia, used this period to agitate for workers to form independant unions and strike for their rights. This came to a head in 2008, with radical workers in the key textile manufacturing city of Mahalla in Egypt calling a general strike; although the strike was crushed, the consequent street demonstrations in the city articulated for the first time the demand for the revolutionary overthrow of the regime, as opposed to reforms or parliamentary change, and pitted the people against the state's apparatus of repression.

Asides from poor pay and the corruption of the regime, basic economic issues – especially the major food shortage – were factors in this uprising; the little reportage it got in the Western media oversimplified this episode into a "bread riot", just one of many around the world occuring. In Tunisia, too, there were strikes and demonstrations by workers and the unemployed  in the Gafsa mining region, which were likewise heavily repressed. These struggles gave birth to the revolutionary social movements which found their expression in what's been called the "Arab spring" – for example, Egypt's leading April 6 Youth Movement takes their name from the date of the 2008 Mahalla general strike. And they were also an important test of strength for the revolutionary workers movement.

So when Mohamed Bouazizi immolated himself on December 17, there was a huge layer of youngnies.Lina Ben Mhenni, Slim Amamou and Azyz Amami. When protests broke out in Bouazizi's city of Sidi Bouzid, young people began posting videos of the spontaneous protests and the following repression on Facebook, and the networks of online activists & journalists were crucial components, alongside the revolutionary workers who initiated demonstrations in most of the major cities, in growing this episode from just another chapter of repression to the point of nadir, the final straw.

So with the combination of these different factors, the Sidi Bouzid uprising spread like wildfire in a way the 2008 Gafsa protests had not been able to. And they brought a critical mass of people to the streets, shutting down the country until elements of the regime – including key military leaders – decided to cut their losses and temporarily side with the movement. This triggered Ben Ali's sudden departure – as documented ical repression going hand in hand with the economics of third world neocolonies.

One of the factors which made the difference between 2008 and 2010 was the technological revolution which had seen cheap broadband internet and internet-ready mobile phones spread through the population in the course of little more than a year. The limited space for digital freedoms was taken up by citizen-journalist bloggers such as Lina Ben Mhenni, Slim Amamou and Azyz Amami. When protests broke out in Bouazizi's city of Sidi Bouzid, young people began posting videos of the spontaneous protests and the following repression on Facebook, and the networks of online activists & journalists were crucial components, alongside the revolutionary workers who initiated demonstrations in most of the major cities, in growing this episode from just another chapter of repression to the point of nadir, the final straw.

So with the combination of these different factors, the Sidi Bouzid uprising spread like wildfire in a way the 2008 Gafsa protests had not been able to. And they brought a critical mass of people to the streets, shutting down the country until elements of the regime – including key military leaders – decided to cut their losses and temporarily side with the movement. This triggered Ben Ali's sudden departure – as documented by an air traffic controller at Tunis airport, part of the internet freedom movement, who forwarded on to the street protests the course of Ben Ali's plane as it attempted to land in France, the neo-colonial power with the biggest stakes in Tunisia's economy, before he was rejected and eventually fled to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where he remains – hopefully to fter that they were ready to demonstrate. Even my family, who normally didn't know anything about politics in Egypt, were asking me, "Are you going to the demonstrations on the 25th of January? We want to go."

I won't go on much further about the events of the uprisings against the dictators themselves. I think it is as important to understand how the situations of those countries have evolved in the last year to see the real strength of this revolutionary movement. As Lina Ben Mhenni told me when I interviewed her by chance in a Tunis cafe where activists and goths hang out - “The revolution did not finish on January 14 (the day Ben Ali was overthrown) — it started on January 14! Ben Ali left the country, but he is just the head of the system." And the same is true for Mubarak in Egypt.

Egypt

In Egypt, since February 11, Friday protests -- in Cairo's Tahrir Square and nationwide -- continubdeen, Shubra – very poor neighbourhoods – and when the police attacked again, many of my friends hid in the houses of ordinary people and told them about the demonstrations. I think this was as important as Facebooke year has progressed; first over a guaranteed transition to civilian rule, then demanding the end to political repression, especially military trials for protesters, then after the October 9 massacre of dozens of Coptic Christians, openly calling for General Tantawi, the head of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (the real power behind the throne; personally members control around 25% of the economy – us aid), to step down.

The Parliamentary elections which began at the end of November and finished in January were a crucial test; one that, in many ways, the movement failed. Mostafa Ali, of Egypt's Revolutionary Socialists, said: "THE political sentiment in Tahrir is ahead of the country. You can think of it as the revolutionary vanguard in society among students and workers and youth--but it is much larger than in January (2011). Political consciousness has developed tremendously.

These are people who understand that the SCAF is the continuation of the Mubarak regime. They are beginning to understand the connection between political and economic issues. They are beginnied more or less every week, with protesters reclaiming it for major sit-ins during July in the hundreds and then again in November in the thousands. These protests have also taken on the regime in more radical ways as the year has progressed; first over a guaranteed transition to civilian rule, then demanding the end to political repression, especially military trials for protesters, then after the October 9 massacre of dozens of Coptic Christians, openly calling for General Tantawi, the head of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (the real power behind the throne; personally members control around 25% of the economy – us aid), to step down.

The Parliamentary elections which began at the end of November and finished in January were a crucial test; one that, in many ways, the movement failed. Mostafa Ali, of Egypt's Revolutionary Socialists, said: "THE political sentiment in Tahrir is ahead of the country. You can think of it as the revolutionary vanguard in society among students and workers and youth--but it is much larger than in January (2011). Political consciousness has developed tremendously.

These are people who understand that the SCAF is the continuation of the Mubarak regime. They are beginning to understand the connection between political and economic issues. They are beginning to grapple with the role of police in society. And they are the ones who understand that the ruling class played a trick on them by using Mubarak as a scapegoat in order to save the rest of the political system.

So you have a minority in society--symbolized by Tahrir--which has advanced politically and in terms of its consciousness. And it's ahead of the rest of the country in that sense. Back in January, a majority of people in the country wanted Mubarak to go, so they supported Tahrir. At this moment, that isn't the case regarding the SCAF."

However, there was not political unity on the question of how the elections would be approached. Another wave of massive protests sprung up several weeks before the elections; initially it seemed the SCAF would have to postpone them, but it gambled that holding them on time would take the wind out of the sails of the protest movement, demanding a civilian council be appointed to take presidential power away from the military before the elections were held. This worked; the days when I was in Cairo, when the elections were being staged there, were some of the low points in Tahrir's occupation, with at best hundreds overnight and a thousand during the day. The Egyptian Socialist Party, the brotherhood youth (split) and some liberal or left forces sought to take parliamentary seats in the "Revolution Continues" alliance; however, other forces such as most of the online activists and the Revolutionary Socialists instead pushed for a boycott of the elections, but not until the days before the elections when it was clear the elections were going ahead.

Tunisia

Despite Egypt's greater geopolitical significance and much larger, poorer and perhaps more revolutionary population, I think the post-January 14 events in Tunisia are more exciting, more significant, and show more about the dynamic of the Arab Spring.

Since the ouster of Ben Ali, Tunisia has seen 22,000 labor protests that include strikes, demonstrations, and other protest activity; Unlike the activity happening before Ben Ali's downfall, this has been across the entire country, interior and coast, and in every sector and industry. Most of these actions have either been supported or led by UGTT (Tunisian General Workers Union). In January of this year left forces – PCOT, LGO, anarchists, social democrats- united to contest and win the leadership of the UGTT; under Ben Ali the union was allowed a stronger degree of autonomy than Egypt's totally anti-worker unions, and branch-level activists could quite often get away with a degree of political activism that only Egypt's journalists could.

Unlike in Egypt, the overthrow of Ben Ali in Tunisia gave way within a month to even bigger protests (the Kasbah sit-ins). These demanded the next step, and the next step, and the next step, in the agenda of democratic reforms; getting rid of Mohammed Ghannouchi, the PM under Ben Ali; getting rid of other ministers; the dissolution of the domestic intelligence services; and the October 2011 constituent assembly elections. The Tunisian left was positioned a little better than the Egyptian left for these elections; nonetheless, the largest revolutionary organising running in the elections, PCOT, won only three seats, while a couple of other forces got one or two seats. However, the lion's share of those involved in the protest movements who wanted to relate to the elections did so as independants, and failed to make any kind of real impact.

The situation in Tunisia since then has continued to evolve; radical islamist forces have gained a lot of space from Ben Ali's downfall, but there has been a corresponding growth in women's rights, workers rights and democratic activism to counter the calls for sharia law and to call for de-criminalisation of dissent.

Lessons

What are the lessons that we here can learn about the revolutionary movements in Egypt, Tunisia and across the Arab World? To me, they come down to the question of leadership. A layer of activists – mostly young, all committed to changing the world – united behind the revolutionary goal of mobilising people to overthrow their dictators. Since the overthrows, these movements have developed and deepened – but an alternative vision to the Islamists wasn't put forward strongly enough in the electoral contests. Perhaps more importantly, efforts to advance the revolution's demands – for real democratic reforms, but also for the fundamental shift of economic priorities away from the washington/imf consensus of neoliberalism – are still yet to win a real political shift. To win this, revolutionary activists don't only need the objective factors to be on their side – the availability of new tools like the internet, the relative poverty, dissatisfaction with the regime – but also the subjective factors – how the layer of revolutionaries organise in these conditions. And until there is some way that the old left parties, the new left parties, the radical democracy activist groups and the independants are able to take the initiative away from the regimes and develop a united platform and work together as a united force, then these revolutions will remain unfinished.

Arab Spring Meeting Notes #1 - Egypt, February

This post is the first in a series of notes from talks that I have given since returning to Australia about the Arab Spring uprisings and revolutionary struggles taking place in the middle-east today. These are raw, and several sections have been copied and pasted from earlier posts I wrote during my time in Egypt & Tunisia last year. I'm posting these in the hopes of getting some critical engagement - pointing out any inaccuracies or errors I've made or alternative theories about the revolutionary upsurge now taking place. Please comment below.

I'd like to start this talk with a little anecdote about the present situation in Egypt which hit close to home on Sunday: Australian journalist Austin Mackell, United States student Derek Ludovici, translator Aliya Alwi and veteran union activist Kamal al-Fayyumi were detained by the police in Mahalla El-Kubra, Egypt on February 11 while trying to interview workers in the city.

From statements posted by Alwi on Twitter, the group faced some "aggression" from locals: "Our car got rocked and beaten against the glass, got called a whore and all sorts of things. Police escorted us to station."

Initially, the group thought they were simply being protected by the police; however, several hours after being detained, the police informed the group that they were being changed with "offering money to youth to vandalise and cause chaos".

Alwi said they were being transferred to military intelligence in the neighbouring city of Tanta in her last tweet; the group were transferred back and forth between different offices and agencies in the two cities as well as the capital of Cairo eight times throughout the three days they were held and then tried.

Mahalla has been the epicentre of independent union activity and strikes in the four years before the January 25, 2011 uprising against Mubarak's rule, continuing throughout the year since. Austin has interviewed workers in the city before; in a video published on April 12 last year, he interviewed Kamal al-Fayyumi about union activity in the city.

The end result of the situation was freedom for all involved on the back of a wave of international & domestic pressure – none of which, shamefully, came from the governments of Australia or America. Austin is still being threatened with deportation due to having overstayed his Visa, and has been told not to leave the country (perhaps banned?), but he remains at large.

Unfortunately, though, that kind of treatment is faced by thousands of Egyptian activists and foreign journalists who want to be part of or just report on the real struggle now underway; and most never receive the attention Austin and Aliya did.

The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), which controls the military authorities (and which, thanks to years of billion-dollar blank cheques from the US, owns of huge swathes of industry). , assumed presidential powers when Hosni Mubarak resigned from office on February 11, 2011. Initially it claimed it was backing the revolutionary movement, but it's clear the SCAF has been Sadat & Mubarak's Greek choir and are keeping up the same neoliberal pro-western agenda now the figurehead is gone.

Activists, unions, bloggers and journalists still face constant harassment — from reactionary "baltageya" gangs made up largely of those with criminal records forced to or paid off to commit political crimes by the interior ministry, as well as from the official state forces like the notorious CSF police department which was responsible for most of the deaths in Tahrir in the last year. The "local resident attack" on Austin & co sounds exactly like the kind of extra-judicial attack often engineered by the "baltageya" – but for many, it ends in an assasination attempt, not just arrest.

More than 12,000 people have been arrested and 8000 charged by military tribunals since the uprising against former dictator Hosni Mubarak began a year ago. Many female detainees have been subjected to cruel and degrading "virginity tests" as part of this, which is something the old regime would never have attempted.

But everything isn't going the regime's way, despite the repression. What Austin was reporting on probably got more attention than it would have internationally thanks to his case – a call by revolutionaries for a general strike on the anniversary of Mubarak's ousting, February 11, after what was possibly the largest EVER demonstration in Tahrir Square on the one-year anniversary of the uprising, January 25.

I spent three different spells in Cairo at the end of last year – in Sept, Oct & Nov – and I was quite lucky to be able to see three different episodes in this ongoing revolutionary struggle. Rather than describe the history of the conflict or what's happened in the last month I'd like to talk about my experiences there last year, as I think it really highlights the direction this movement is going in.

I arrived in Egypt the day before the September 9 protests that brought tens of thousands into the street, marches to the Ministry of Interior and the Supreme Court, and then the storming of the Israeli embassy; Egypt certainly threw me in at the deep end! But arriving in Cairo at almost any point last year would have been like that. I met strangers at protests and on the street who in a very Egyptian way invited me to take tea, most trying to con me in some way, at one point asking me to take part in a wedding ceremony, and who all talked politics. Not everyone on the street was with the revolution, but the atmosphere is one of open debate of politics, leaders, policies and movements – before January 25 last year, the closest most Egyptians came to doing this in public was talking about their football clubs, although that in itself is a somewhat political thing!

Tens of thousands of Egyptians reclaimed Tahrir square after several weeks of police occupation on September 9, demanding an end to military trials of civilians and for judicial freedom. The atmosphere was like nothing in Australia I'd been to – somewhere between a protest, a vast open-air conference with ongoing workshops and debates around the clock, and a democracy festival on the scale of the BDO music festival here.

Throughout 2011, Friday protests -- in Cairo's Tahrir Square and nationwide -- have been going on more or less every week. The week after September 9, there was a protest at Tahrir Square of around a thousand against the military trials; a fortnight later, 1500 at "back to the barracks" protests demanding a quicker timetable for creating a civilian government. The politics of these protests and the movement as a whole have kept getting sharper and more radical since.

But even outside of what could be called the "democracy" movement of bloggers and activists and Tahrir square, there has been mass democratic struggles in almost all layers of society, and the Tahrir protests are really only the tip of the iceberg. As such, the situation in Egypt, or indeed Tunisia or Libya or Syria or anywhere else, shouldn't just be considered in terms of who has taken power or who is leading the movements. But I'll come back to that.

Another crucial stage occured in October, when a majority who had previously been taken in by the SCAF's lies saw through the veil.

Walking around downtown Cairo on October 10, everything felt relatively normal ― if, perhaps, a little more tense than usual for post-January 25 Cairo, with Tahrir empty and lots of shops closed.
That is, until I came across the wrecks of burnt out cars on the Corniche el Nil in Maspero, just north of Tahrir Square, being pulled apart by enterprising young men.

The night before, Coptic Christians marched from Shubra to protest acts of discrimination against Copts by the interim government and islamist gangs being funded from the Gulf, including the destruction of St. George's Church in Aswan and the forceful break-up of a protest on October 5. The marchers were assaulted by unidentified groups of thugs – undoubtedly baltageya - before being arrested & massacred en masse by the military and police.

At least 26 people were killed in the ensuing violence, many by army armoured personnel carriers that drove straight into the crowd of thousands, gunners firing wildly above and into the crowd – now iconic images.

The regime has been busily exploiting religious tensions within Egypt since the fall of Mubarak, trying to split the unity between Christians, Muslims, atheists and other Egyptians shown during the occupations of Tahrir Square.

This includes broadcasts from the state media, which, as protesters were being massacred on October 9, were busily reporting that Christians were stealing weapons from the army and killing Muslim soldiers.

Yet, despite this campaign, the graffiti around the city showing the Christian cross and the Islamic crescent, with the words "2gether 4ever", has been some of the best preserved since the start of the revolution.

Another rumour repeated to me on the streets of downtown Cairo as the bloodshed was unfolding was that the protesters were marching to support Mubarak or try and influence the outcome of his trial and those of his colleagues in crime, which were just wrapping up and being broadcast in every shop on every tv and every radio – even the KFC & McDonalds at Tahrir!

No doubt seeking to bolster their own support base and fan the flames of religious tension, the Muslim Brotherhood released a statement calling on Copts to cease protesting for the sake of "democracy".

“There are certain channels, means and times for demanding legitimate demands and all Egyptian people have legitimate demands, not only our Coptic brothers,” said the statement. “This is certainly not the right time to demand them since the current government is an interim government and the general conditions are abnormal."

The Brotherhood demanded the regime keep the current timetable for elections, which they did bringing Ikhwan to parliamentary majority in January.

The Revolutionary Socialists, on the other hand, condemned the oppression of Copts "which goes hand-in-hand with a policy of divide and rule between Christian and Muslim working people".
"We will continue to defend our revolution, and the people’s right to free expression, to protest, demonstrate and strike, in order to restore our stolen rights, and to cleanse the country of the roots of corruption, which is still poisoning our revolution and attempting to overturn it," their statement read.
The interim government responded violence and international condemnation by launching a quick inquiry, detaining 25 suspects implicated in the violence. It added the “Equality Law” to the penal code, which stipulates special punishment for anyone who carries out any action that causes violence against individuals or communities based on gender, race, language or religion, or which might lead to unequal opportunity or social inequality. But police have abandoned enforcing ordinary laws since January 25, except when they want a bribe. The only police I saw not lurking around on the street or facing off against protesters were the traffic cops.

Ultimately, this incident was crucial in turning mass consciousness against the SCAF; prior to it, polls showed only 10% believed SCAF was against the revolution, afterwards, between 40 and 60%.
Each episode of mass repression beyond the constant ongoing attacks on the movement might buy the regime a little time and stability, but it has radicalised more and more people.

As I said, the Muslim Brotherhood or Ikhwan were the winners of the Dec-Jan parliamentary elections, which were poorly managed and, while not directly rigged and indeed quite open compared to elections under Mubarak, bound to deliver a result to reactionary anti-revolutionary forces given the conditions for the new parties and the flow of money from the gulf to religious parties, and the best representatives of Tahrir, the "Revolution Continues alliance" of radical social democrats, left-liberal, left-Islamist and socialist forces, won only 8 seats of the 454, with the Egyptian Socialist Party winning none at all. Largely, this was because of protests going on in November before and through the elections, which was the last time I was in Cairo.



I arrived in the night before the elections would begin, which was the tail end of a two-week wave of street battles against vivious repression than included more than 20 deaths and a huge number of injuries, many caused by snipers with birdshot ammunition aiming to cripple & blind protesters. These protests were designed to push the SCAF to hand over power to a civilian "salvation council" for the course of the elections, but by the week leading up to the elections the military made a gamble and stopped attempting to clear the square itself, while appointing a new government and PM – Kamal Ganzouri, another stooge of the military once PM under Mubarak – and in response, Tahrir protesters & those at the smaller sit in outside the Cabinet of Ministers which was calling for Ganzouri's resignation largely boycotted the election. But the call for a boycott went out too late and was up against too much propaganda from the regime, the Brotherhood & other forces to pick up widespread support.

Occupy Cabinet was one interesting thing to note, as it was a lot like Occupy Sydney (only 300 camping at the largest, down to 25 overnight) with its own security line, makeshift tarp tents and medical stations, with a lot broader support than #O has here, but still quite a way ahead of the mass consciousness – many Egyptians came through the lines to see what it looked like, and some of them told me they didn't support the group even though they supported Tahrir (which through Nov-Dec had more like 500 at any one time, maintaining a complete occupation of the roundabout and entrance to the Mogamma state offices).

In a sense the failure of the movement to take a united approach to the elections showed the issues with lack of a united leadership for the protest movement; the Revolutionary Youth Coalition uniting key groups like A6YM and supporters of El Baradei (which had one member elected to parliament) has not beed democratically elected, while the socialist left (ESP & RS probably being the most notable) has not yet built a mass audience. Promisingly, many of the Occupy Cabinet protesters were from a variety of left groups – of the ones I spoke to one from ESP, one from Communist, one from the MB youth split, several El Baradei supporters, and many more independants who were quite open to all those different tendencies – but there's no forum yet that I know of for these revolutionaries to discuss taking a lead, rather than responding to the developments of the movement.

So I'll wrap it up with a quick update on what's been happening in the last month. The new parliament has been calling on unions & protesters to shut up and get the country's struggling economy back on its feet, maintaining the vicious attacks on protest, and signalling they will take out more loans from the IMF on the condition of economic restructuring – so the current stage of the movement is awakening Egyptians to the knowledge that political Islam is no real alternative to the Mubarak consensus.

As I said, the January 25 first anniversary protests were bigger than even the original uprising, which shows that despite the savage repression and the confusion of the parliamentary elections, the basic demands of the movement – real civilian government and an end to military influence, and above all an end to neoliberal attacks and real pro-poor economic reforms – still have mass popular support and are still bringing people onto the streets.

The region has reached an era, after a half-century ascendancy of dictators and neoliberalism, when the 99% are fighting back and claiming the ascendancy. The leaders of this movement now are the ones who developed still under the old ascendancy of tyranny and capital, and the forces taking power in elections are those who have money or influence, not those who in any real sense represent Tahrir. But that doesn't mean we should write off the struggles as a whole; as socialists who support the right to self-determination, we should show critical solidarity with these struggles, and while remaining aware of the contradictions as they emerge or deepen, should see past these to the real struggles against capital that are at the heart of the Arab Spring.

#Free Austin 11/03

On the 11th of March, myself and around 60-70 other activists, friends, family & colleagues of Austin Mackell rallied outside the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (or Department of Fucking Around and Timewasting, as I prefer) to demand our parachute Foreign Minister, Bob Carr, make public statements and take action on Austin's behalf.

Rally for Austin Mackell, 11/03

You can also check out three videos of the protest posted on YouTube.

Rally for Austin Mackell, 11/03 - boys in blue in the back...

A Change.org petition has been circulating calling for both Carr & Julia Gillard to intervene on Austin's behalf, along with an open letter in the same vein. Between my signing the petition yesterday and the time of posting, the signatures have gone up by at least a couple of thousand. Let's hope it hits ten thousand by the time I check tomorrow night...

Hillier Windsor, Austin's sister, speaking at the rally, 11/03.

Austin himself has written several pieces on the question of his arrest; the first is his firsthand account of the events in Mahalla, an amazing look at the belly of the beast which is worth reading for anyone who wants to understand how the police bureaucracy in a police/military state like Egypt actually runs. Since then, he's written another two pieces: one, a letter calling for Bob Carr to intervene, and another speculating as to the reasons why his arrest may be preceeding. As usual, Austin is able to see how the issue (in this case, his own arrest) gets to the heart of the post-January 25 balance of forces in Egypt and what it says for the ongoing revolutionary struggle.

The "Iron Lady" he identifies, Fayza Aboul-Naga is, according to Ahram Online, more well known internationally than General Tantawi; I doubt this is actually true, but either way it bodes poorly for Austin's case if it's become part of the maneuvering amongst Egypt's corrupt bureaucrats. Deckchairs on the Titanic, etc etc... And either way, it means pressure from the Australian government may make a real difference in the outcome, either for Austin's freedom to work or at the very least his freedom to leave the country.

Bob Carr probably won't be inclined to do this, given that he's about as corrupt a bureacrat as they come (check out this video on what he actually stands for), so your pressure is needed. I'd encourage everyone to sign the petition, or check out the series of letters to members of parliament Austin's posted on his blog, write your own, and come to the next protest calling for the government to take action.

Lee Rhiannon, Greens Senator, speaking at the rally, 11/03 - photo courtesy of Kate Ausburn

Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon spoke at the rally, and said that the Greens will be actively pursuing this issue through the parliament. According to her twitter account, the motion they put calling for the government to take action passed the senate this evening.

Yours Truly speaking at the rally, 11/03... photo courtesy of Kate Ausburn