May I have more votes please?

Hi,

A bit later than initially promised, here's some more on the whole
voting thing here in Egypt.
Disclaimer: since they didn't want to have my vote, I didn't bother to vote
at all. So most of it today is what I got from talking to Egyptian
friends and colleagues.
The voting here in Cairo (and Giza) took 6 days, all in all. It
started in Cairo, 2 days of voting. Then 2 weeks later there would be
voting in Giza, again for 2 days. Just because the schools and other
public places where people could cast their vote had to be secured. And then it was all over, more or less.
An important fact to keep in mind is that for many people this was the first time to vote ever. For most because they never bothered to vote because they felt the elections were rigged anyway. So a true democratic process was key to be proven. Now think about this; there were 2 weeks between the voting in Cairo and Giza, enough time to 'update' some of the votes in Cairo to predict the outcome of the elections. So what happened, the votes from the 1st round were already counted and published. The Brotherhood turned out to be the big winners, but a big chunk of the votes was still out there. Publishing the outcome can be considered a way of manipulating the second round. Although this is realistic, I would say it is more realistic in the Western world. Why? Because here in Egypt a big part of the population didn't even know how to vie in the first place. People at the voting stations, of course affiliated with one of the parties, where available to 'help' those that were not able to understand how to cast their vote. And if somebody tells you to just select the little triangle when you consider yourself a good Muslim... You can imagine the rest. Again, I got all this information from talking to friends and colleagues.

Now there is one thing I want to share which I believe is really awesome. I will try not to be speculative on this. One thing I learned is that in the rural areas, owners of the large farms and other companies actually hired busses to take their employees to the voting office to be able to cast their vote. How about that for facilitating democracy? I could be cynical and assume that during the bus ride the propaganda engine was blasting away, but that would be cynical and highly speculative as nobody I talked to hinted in that direction at all.

In the end it turned out that the majority of the votes has gone to the Brotherhood and that is no surprise. The Brotherhood insists that they are not proponents of an Islamic government but time will truly tell. For now, I still think that the army is still the party that is really wielding any power. There is still a lot at stake for them and the presidential elections still need to take place.
Still, the first steps are taken and the elections passed by relatively peaceful, although we shouldn't forget the massacre a few weeks ago after the soccer match. According to many instigated by Mubarak followers and a group of rich people that have much to loose when the army looses their grip on every day life and the economy.

In any case, democracy in Egypt still has a long way to go. But then again, when you look at the Netherlands, it took more than a century to get to where democracy in the Netherlands is today.

Iwan
--
"This is true: the world is better off with some people gone. Our lives are
not all interconnected. That theory is a crock. Some people truly do not
need to be here." from American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

May I have your votes please?

Hi there, happy New Year,

You might have been wondering where my blogposts went and why nothing about the elections in Egypt. Well the answer is not that simple. Let me explain; As you might know by now, Egypt is a big country, most of it is inhabitable desert. The majority of the population lives along the Nile and around the Red Sea, for obvious reasons. That population by the way consists of about 80,000,000 people, about 5 times the Dutch
population. Most of them living in the greater Cairo area. This is one of the tidbits I recently learned; Cairo is not just one city, it's a few cities together, or governerates they call them I believe (sorry, didn't do too much research). The main two governerates are Cairo and Giza. I live in Cairo and work in Giza. I guess that it compares with the Randstad in the Netherlands. There are about 20 mln people living in this area, commonly referred to as Cairo.

Back to the elections.

In the last bit of 2011 there were the elections in Egypt. These were about the parliament, the new parliament after the revolution. The weeks prior to the elections were full of disturbances again and
Tahrir square was the arena for fights between revolutionairiess and the army.
But even before that, it was decided that there would be several days with some time in between to do the elections! Or rather the voting. This because the government couldn't guarantee safety for all voters at all voting centers, which were schools and other public facilities. The voting was rather uneventful but than again, there were a lot of soldiers on the streets. Although I also think that in general the Egyptian people are not that 'riotish' in the first place.
So, once the first round was done, which took 2 days, there was a period of 2 weeks during which the army relocated and another 2 days of voting was done. First Cairo, than Giza. To me this was very odd, unprecedented in fact. But understandable.

Was this the better solution? Were there alternatives? Are these elections really democratic? Will the new parliament bring stability? Read about my view on things later this week.

Iwan

It will be a very disappointing month...

... for some people.

Hi,

Regular followers of my adventures in Egypt have suffered considerably lately as I haven't blogged for quite a while.

I have my reasons, but that's for another post some time soon, I think.

November, as it seems, will be election month. I believe it's for the parliament here in Egypt. More importantly it is for many the first time ever that the outcome is really not predictable. Obviously
because the current government is just a peacekeepr for the army generals that have been ruling for the last decades. So unless somebody has rigged the elections, there's no telling what
the outcome will be.
What I think that will happen is that the turn-up will be high. Mainly because of the fact that everybody has for the first time since a very long time the idea that now it matters. "These elections your vote will actually count" is what some of my Egyptian friends have said to me. Before they wouldn't vote because that only made sense when you were pro Mubarak.

Both with this I think it important to mention that although your vote counts, a single vote in an 80,000,000 population is, by itself, not very significant. (Still you should always exercise your democratic rights.) But what I'm trying to say is that one as an individual might vote on party X, but that doesn't automatically mean that party X will win the elections or even gets a seat in the parliament.
So my feeling is that many of the 80mln here in Egypt will be facing that democracy has no real impact on their lifes because the majority of the population doesn't share the same feelings and beliefs.
In fact, the majority of the population had completely different motivations for a revolution than those that started it all. Money vs Democracy.

"The revolution might result possibly in democracy, but also, at the same time, to less freedom" is another concern one friend of mine expressed. He referred to the fact that a new democratically elected government might very well be very conservative and very much against a secular system. The revolutionairies will be very disappointed, seeing all their good effort go to waste.

In a democracy, the elected government may very well not be the one you would like to see. But more importantly, in a democracy, the elected government must be the government for all and therefore it should respect all equally and provide equal opportunity to all. Which means compromises are required, otherwise the democratically elected government will be killing the democracy once ruling.
There is no room for extremist beliefs in a democracy. So it is imperative that the new government will not keep all of its promises. And the naïve voters, which there will be many, will be disappointed
as it will seem to them that the new politicians are just as crooked as the old regime was.

A main concern here in Egypt with many is what will happen after the elections. Sofar there seems to be no tension at all. We're about 2 weeks away from election day, and it's quiet in the streets, relatively quiet that is. But the worry is about what will happen after the election. Will the army allow a new government? Will they respect the democracy even when it means they'll loose a lot of their current power? Will the people accept the outcome of the elections?

Am I worried about all this? Not really to be honest. The Egyptian people are a very mellow and very peaceful people. Yes there've been incidents since the revolution, but these have been incidents with
relatively small groups.
I am preparing though. Have sufficient water and soda (Coke, Mountain Dew and 7UP Diet) in my fridge. Bread and some frozen food that my driver made for me in the freezer, a new jar of jam and plenty of unplayed Xbox games and unread books on my Kindle. But I would've had this in any case.

I just hope that it will be the media that will be disappointed, because there will be no riots in the streets, no killings, no uproar... No 'news' for them to report.



Iwan

What about having a big vault with US$ 80,000,000,000?

Hi,

Just the other day I was contemplating on what I would do if I had US$ 80,000,000,000 and I have to admit I wasn't able to even spend half of it. I'm just not that much up to date on what people that have that kind of cash spend it on.
Now former president of Egypt Mubarak supposedly has or should I say had that kind of money. And since Egypt is very much a cash economy, I envision him having this massive vault somewhere safe in the dessert just like Scrooge McDuck (Dagobert Duck in Dutch). And when he feels sad he goes there swimming in all that money.

I wonder whether you really care about money when you have that much. Would he really have bargained his way across the local market shopping for groceries? I guess so, because it's part of the Egyptian culture and after all Mubarak was the self proclaimed father of the people.
But when you have so much money that it would take you a lifetime to count it, do you really care whether something costs 1 Egyptian Pound or 1 Piaster? I think everything feels to be for free. You would probably act the way. Or not.
I remember coming here about a year and a half ago and still thinking in €'s and constantly doing the math to translate all prices to €'s and time after time be amazed about the local prices. People telling me that I'm shopping for my groceries at the expensive supermarket and I am wondering how things could be even cheaper.
But you adjust and everything turns out to be relative. That can of Coke (the drink) that is only LE 2.53, which is about 30 €ct's used to be only LE 2,16 before the revolution I remember. Which is also about 30 €ct. I guess Mubarak was facing the same after getting used to be able to buy everything edible available in the Egyptian markets.

So what is your biggest worry then, when it isn't what you can and cannot buy? I guess it is loosing all that wealth. I mean that even when you take all the stories with a big bag of salt, Mubarak went out of his way to protect that vault in the dessert. He had a whole army of policemen roaming the streets 24x7, constantly on the look out to spot possible threats to public and private safety.
And then there was the army of... Well just the army that supported Mubarak and I would think that that was the reason why he could stay in office for that long (roughly 30 years). Of course being re-elected all the time also helps but that only counts when you have proper opposition and the people
voting actually have a selection of presidential candidates to chose from.
Now think with me, you're supporting a person that has 80bln is cash stashed somewhere in a vault in the dessert. And this person can only acquire that kind of money and keep it hidden because of you.  What does this mean to you? Exactly, you're probably the nicest supporter, the biggest fan or an
extremist altruistic devotee. Or, and I realize I might seem a bit paranoid or conspirational here, you're securing that same amount of money as the guy he takes the fall when everything falls to shambles. But that is unlikely, that's like thinking former president Bush knew that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq but he just wanted to invade that part of the world to show his dad (former president Bush) that he could out-war him in the gulf.
I think that everybody here is a victim of misconception, misunderstanding and demonization by the media. I mean, everybody is innocent until proven guilty, but more importantly, everybody has the universal right (mandated by the UN no less) to pursue his or her happiness. And when somebody gets
of the right track and forgets about the fact that his fellow man has the same basic human rights, it just proves that he's merely human.

And so I am digressing once again and by realizing this, I realize that I should put an end to this post. Please feel free to comment and when I offended you in anyway, it was not my intention at all.

Iwan