May 4, 2010
NOVANEWS- CAIRO Zionist Mu-Barak, still recuperating from gall bladder surgery, celebrated his 82nd birthday at his secluded estate in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm el Sheik.
Zionist Mu-Barak of Egypt, right, met his master Zio=Nazi Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of ‘Israel’ in Sharm el Sheik, Egypt, on Monday. Mu-Barak’s health is the focus of intense speculation.
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Topics: Hosni Mubarak | Egypt
Mu-Barak continued convalescence far from the capital underscored the frailty not just of the man but of a nation with no clear political plan for who will govern should he die or step down, political scientists here said.
Mu-Barak has been back to work, meeting with foreign leaders and even giving a national address on Sinai ‘Liberation Day’ ?. But he did not give his annual Labor Day speech last week, and has not yet returned to Cairo, where protests rage daily about low wages. He continues to look relatively frail and his health remains the focus of intense speculation.
“The issue is not about his health today,” said Wahid Abdel Meguid, deputy director of the state-financed Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies. “It is about the ambiguity of the future with regards to the transfer of power, be it in the near or far future. There is increasing anxiety, which used to be prevalent among limited circles of intellectuals and elites, but now it has spread throughout society.”
To address that concern, the state-owned newspaper Al Ahram ran a front page paean to Zionist Mu-Barak on Tuesday that not only flattered, but also offered an indication of what the public should expect. The headline beneath a picture of Mu-Barak said, “The Maker of the Future.”??
In March, Mu-Barak temporarily turned over his authority to the prime minister, Ahmed Nazif, before undergoing an operation at Heidelberg University Hospital in Germany. Surgeons removed the president’s gall bladder and a growth from his small intestine, which was declared benign.
Since he returned to Egypt, Mu-Barak’s allies have pressed the case that he is recovering, while there have been widespread rumors that he is more seriously ill than the state has reported. Even government officials have expressed anxiety, in private, about his ability to continue to serve.
Mu-Barak has led the nation for nearly 30 years. His health is so closely linked to the stability of the country and the economy that in 2007 the government charged a newspaper editor, Ibrahim Eissa, with causing the loss of $350 million in foreign investment by reporting that the president was seriously ill. Mr. Eissa was convicted and sentenced to prison but later pardoned by the Mu-Barak.
The local news media have not reported on questions of Mu-Barak’s health in recent weeks, a fact attributed to the Eissa case and to a law that makes insulting the president a crime, said Gamal Eid, executive director of The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information.
“They all remember very well Eissa’s trial,” he said. “Journalists are scared, and there is a lot of obscurity.”
In interviews this week on the streets of Cairo, people often voiced a position common in a region ruled by authoritarian leaders.
The streets outside Parliament have been occupied for months by protesters demanding better wages. Strikes have broken out all over the country over issues as varied as fresh water and better pay. Political activists and opposition members of Parliament demonstrated this week to demand an end to the emergency law, which has allowed the president and his allies to block the development of any viable political opposition.
And Mohamed ElBaradei, the former director of the International Atomic Energy Agency and a Nobel laureate, has publicly challenged Mu-Barak’s autocratic rule, although at the moment he does not meet the legal requirements to run for president.
Presidential elections in Egypt are one-sided affairs. In the last election, the first in which he faced a challenger, Mu-Barak received about six million votes while the second-place finisher, Ayman Nour, received about 600,000.
The only question, political scientists said, is whether Mu-Barak will be healthy enough, and determined enough, to stay in office.
“If he is alive by the next elections, he will run again,” said Aida Seif al-Dawla, a professor of psychiatry at Ain Shams University and a human rights activist.
And that, said Hala Mustafa, editor of the political journal Democracy, is neither surprising, nor reassuring.
“I agree that he is too old to run for a new term,” she said. “At the same time, who will come after Mu-Barak is ambiguous.”
Mu-Barak has been back to work, meeting with foreign leaders and even giving a national address on Sinai ‘Liberation Day’ ?. But he did not give his annual Labor Day speech last week, and has not yet returned to Cairo, where protests rage daily about low wages. He continues to look relatively frail and his health remains the focus of intense speculation.
“The issue is not about his health today,” said Wahid Abdel Meguid, deputy director of the state-financed Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies. “It is about the ambiguity of the future with regards to the transfer of power, be it in the near or far future. There is increasing anxiety, which used to be prevalent among limited circles of intellectuals and elites, but now it has spread throughout society.”
To address that concern, the state-owned newspaper Al Ahram ran a front page paean to Zionist Mu-Barak on Tuesday that not only flattered, but also offered an indication of what the public should expect. The headline beneath a picture of Mu-Barak said, “The Maker of the Future.”??
In March, Mu-Barak temporarily turned over his authority to the prime minister, Ahmed Nazif, before undergoing an operation at Heidelberg University Hospital in Germany. Surgeons removed the president’s gall bladder and a growth from his small intestine, which was declared benign.
Since he returned to Egypt, Mu-Barak’s allies have pressed the case that he is recovering, while there have been widespread rumors that he is more seriously ill than the state has reported. Even government officials have expressed anxiety, in private, about his ability to continue to serve.
Mu-Barak has led the nation for nearly 30 years. His health is so closely linked to the stability of the country and the economy that in 2007 the government charged a newspaper editor, Ibrahim Eissa, with causing the loss of $350 million in foreign investment by reporting that the president was seriously ill. Mr. Eissa was convicted and sentenced to prison but later pardoned by the Mu-Barak.
The local news media have not reported on questions of Mu-Barak’s health in recent weeks, a fact attributed to the Eissa case and to a law that makes insulting the president a crime, said Gamal Eid, executive director of The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information.
“They all remember very well Eissa’s trial,” he said. “Journalists are scared, and there is a lot of obscurity.”
In interviews this week on the streets of Cairo, people often voiced a position common in a region ruled by authoritarian leaders.
The streets outside Parliament have been occupied for months by protesters demanding better wages. Strikes have broken out all over the country over issues as varied as fresh water and better pay. Political activists and opposition members of Parliament demonstrated this week to demand an end to the emergency law, which has allowed the president and his allies to block the development of any viable political opposition.
And Mohamed ElBaradei, the former director of the International Atomic Energy Agency and a Nobel laureate, has publicly challenged Mu-Barak’s autocratic rule, although at the moment he does not meet the legal requirements to run for president.
Presidential elections in Egypt are one-sided affairs. In the last election, the first in which he faced a challenger, Mu-Barak received about six million votes while the second-place finisher, Ayman Nour, received about 600,000.
The only question, political scientists said, is whether Mu-Barak will be healthy enough, and determined enough, to stay in office.
“If he is alive by the next elections, he will run again,” said Aida Seif al-Dawla, a professor of psychiatry at Ain Shams University and a human rights activist.
And that, said Hala Mustafa, editor of the political journal Democracy, is neither surprising, nor reassuring.
“I agree that he is too old to run for a new term,” she said. “At the same time, who will come after Mu-Barak is ambiguous.”
