Former President Mohamed Morsi’s abilities to govern a country in transition did not help Egypt’s already huge list of problems. However, his party’s faults hardly justified the kind of coup that took place, Middle East blogger Karl Sharro told RT.
That is despite Morsi’s lack of understanding of how to properly
mix religion and politics and avoid marginalizing a large segment
of Egypt’s population, he believes.
RT:The overthrow of Morsi has been called a coup, but
clearly he had massive popular support, so is that strictly the
term to be used here?
Karl Sharro: Absolutely. We have to look not only at
popular presence on the street, but at procedure. The army was
involved: tanks and armored personnel carriers were driven
around, the leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood were arrested –
including the president. There is no other way to describe this
than a coup. So I think that needs to be made very clear.
RT:The Muslim Brotherhood keeps saying ‘resist the army’;
they are calling for peaceful revolt, but we live in the real
world. Every time this happens there is bloodshed.
KS: Unfortunately this is the kind of situation where the
military had, in its reaction to the popular uprising, contrived
to create. But let’s remember what the real interest here is.
It’s not the continuation of the democratic revolution. The
military stepping in and effectively carrying out this coup is to
stop the spread of the January popular uprising – and in my book,
that would include people taking power and resorting to a
democratic process. What we saw there is exactly the opposite,
which is canceling the results of democratic elections.
RT:What would you say were the failings of Morsi’s
term in power? We talked about the economy and what went wrong,
but it wasn’t just that.
KS: There was a host of failures. I don’t want to give the
impression that I’m a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood: I’m
usually critical both, of the role of religion that they brought
into politics and of their lack of competence in administering
the country and managing the transition towards democracy,
reviving the economy and the sectarian language they’ve used
consistently. There is a huge host of problems and a lack of
ability for President Morsi to step up and represent the entire
Egyptian population – the people that voted and represented him –
and the other camp as well. So I think there are e huge failings,
none of which justify a military coup against him.
RT:And religion was one of the key parts that went
wrong for him, no?
KS: Yes, absolutely. I think that alienated both people
like Christians and secularists, but also Muslim people who don’t
think religion should be brought into politics in such a crass
manner. But at the end of the day, the Muslim Brotherhood was
elected with people knowing who they were. And not only did they
win the presidential elections – with the help, of course, of
people from other political affiliations – but they also won the
parliamentary election, the results of which were canceled and
the parliament was also annulled and disbanded. There’s a host of
grievances, and they reflect on that period in the Egyptian
transition when there wasn’t a single authority that was in
control. But having said that, Egypt should have been given the
chance to transition towards a more democratic future, and carry
out the process and for the Muslim Brotherhood to be kicked out
of office by resorting to that democratic process – not by
military means.
RT:What should the Muslim Brotherhood do now? The interim
government is saying there will be new elections and a new
parliament early next year. Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood are
saying they don’t want anything to do with that. But should they
get in on it while they still can?
KS: That’s a tactical decision that at the end of the day
will be up to them. But what we have to look at is that by
participating in that process they would be legitimizing this
sort of coup, which is something we’ve seen already when Western
governments – America and Europe – lectured us for a long time
about the merits of democracy. You can’t legitimize that as the
Muslim Brotherhood and I think a form of boycotting might be the
tactical choice, but that will be done down the road, in the
realm of details, because nobody can say conclusively there
wouldn’t be some kind of deals to bring the Muslim Brotherhood
back in one shape or another, because the military doesn’t want
to be in the front row leading the country, so it will seek to
cover itself and bring some sort of civilian legitimacy to it.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.