Protests in Tunisia have sent shock waves across Egypt, Jordan and Yemen, where the appetite for ousting autocrats is strong
Brian Whitaker
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 26 January 2011
With Video: The 'Tiananmen Square' moment in Cairo .
"The past few days have seen anti-government protesters on the streets of Egypt, Jordan and Yemen – inspired in each case by the uprising that toppled President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali in Tunisia. In Algiers, riot police also suppressed a planned march calling for the president's resignation which had been organised by the Rally for Culture and Democracy, a secular party with strong Berber connections......
Egypt: the big one
The huge demonstrations in Egypt yesterday didn't come entirely out of the blue. Strikes and street protests have long been a feature of Egyptian life and the political debate there is far more open than it was in Tunisia. The shock yesterday was in the scale of the protests – far beyond what the authorities and even the organisers expected, and all that without much support from the traditional opposition parties (including the Muslim Brotherhood which had declined to give its formal backing).
As in Tunisia, the protests were largely secular and instigated by the Facebook generation – the 6 April Youth Movement and Kifaya ("Enough") – along with trade unionists.
There were many allusions to Tunisia in yesterday's protests. Add to that the economic situation in Egypt, the blatantly rigged (and widely mocked) parliamentary election last month, an 82-year-old president who has spent 30 years in power and seems intent on handing over to his son, years of repression by the regime, frustrated youth and a general sense this can't go on much longer – and you have all the ingredients for rebellion.
Where does it go from here? ......"
No comments:
Post a Comment