Mohamed ElBaradei warns Egypt it is letting a 'new emperor' take over

Nobel laureate blames Muslim Brotherhood and revolutionary youth for letting the generals engineer coup

Jack Shenker in Cairo
guardian.co.uk, Friday 15 June 2012

"Egypt is suffering under worse conditions now than under Hosni Mubarak's dictatorship, Mohamed ElBaradei has told the Guardian, and it is on the brink of allowing a "new emperor" to establish total domination over the country.

He gave a withering assessment of the Muslim Brotherhood movement, which dominated the now defunct new parliamentary assembly and whose presidential candidate, Mohamed Morsi, will face a run-off against Mubarak's last prime minister in elections this weekend.

ElBaradei said political Islamists had tried to take "the whole cake" for themselves following the overthrow of Mubarak last February, and as a result Egypt's ruling generals had been able to engineer an assault on the revolution.

"We are in a total mess, a confused process that – assuming good intentions – has led us nowhere except the place we were at 18 months ago, but under even more adverse conditions," said the Nobel laureate, who withdrew from the presidential race this year arguing that a fair vote could not be held while the country remained in the grip of a military junta.

"We are going to elect a president in the next couple of days without a constitution and without a parliament. He will be a new emperor, holding both legislative and executive authority and with the right to enact laws and even amend the constitution as he sees fit."......

ElBaradei, a former UN nuclear weapons inspector turned prominent Egyptian dissident, predicted Ahmed Shafiq – Mubarak's last prime minister and the man seen by many as an embodiment of the old regime – would emerge victorious from the poll.

"Shafiq as president of the 'new Egypt' is an oxymoron," said the 69-year-old. "In this scenario the new president would be backed by Scaf and political authority in the country will continue to be held by Scaf, but I think it most likely that he is the one that is going to win.".......

....... with his harshest words reserved for the Muslim Brotherhood – whose role in the past year's "transition process" has led many pro-change activists to blame political Islamists for empowering the military and being sucked into an electoral game designed to give the old regime a façade of democratic legitimacy.

......... And that created a backlash, which will be visible in the next couple of days. People have called on them to withdraw from the presidential race, but they insist on going forward – why?" ......."