What is happening right now in Egypt is exactly what I expected to happen, I am not at all surprised or upset. This is a consequence of a series of short-sighted decisions with no long term foresight, which is a major, crippling characteristic of Egypt.
No one makes the right decision for the right outcome. Rather, decisions are made based on what is 'good enough' for right now. It happens every single day on every single level.
It happens when someone decides to drive down the wrong way on a one way street, which screws everyone else up, causes traffic jams blocks over, and results in exaggerated horn honking and yelling. The wrong driver picks the fight, justifying the mess he caused with the convenience of taking a short cut. And everyone accommodates him by moving out of the way-- and he never learns a lesson.
It happens whenever a contractor takes the easy way out on every single one of my projects, doing dumb-ass things I've never seen on a construction site before. Things like oh, it was easier to just run a waste pipe right through the kitchen floor, which will now raise it 30cm (12") so, now we have a ceiling height of just 1.8m (5'9"), so we'll just have to get someone short to work in the kitchen. Huh? Or let's open a Lebanese restaurant next door to our pizzeria, but make the guests access the 150 square meter Lebanese restaurant through the 30 square meter pizzeria, so we don't have to make 2 entrances. But keep the maximum number of seats in the pizzeria. The customers can just squeeze past the tables.
It happened when they built new suburbs about 45 minutes outside of Cairo, to lighten the load and traffic on Cairo. But instead of including in these developments, most of which are as large as Cairo themselves, a plan for infrastructure or public transportation, i.e., trains or buses, they made them accessible via one road. One. Paralyzing traffic TO and FROM Cairo, because everyone still works there and has to drive in each and every day.
It happened when Egypt hosted its first ever election, and hastily voted for Morsi rather than the left-over from the old regime.
Morsi comes from a group of people who are so threatening, the previous governments spent decades trying to diffuse and suppress them. Decades. Affiliated with Hamas, and known to be terrorists, Egyptians gave the Muslim brotherhood the power they spent decades killing for. Last year, tucked away in NYC- away from Egypt for 3 years, I could see all the problems Egypt would (and did) have, from miles away.
Did anyone think that the MBs might clean up their act once they got power? Or was this just another short-sighted decision with terrible consequences?
Of course the US is accused ofinfluencing the election and negotiating a deal with the MB, which gave them American and Israeli support, and thus, the presidential position. I don't doubt that for a minute, because America's goal is to control as many puppets around the world, as possible. Egypt has been one of its favorite puppets for decades, and that will always be maintained for America's so called "freedom," or rather, "best interests." Egypt will always have to be poor, and its people will always have to remain largely ignorant so that it never catches up to the US or Israel. Egypt is suppressed to remain a 3rd world country, giving Israel the upper hand, and thereby adhering to the Camp David accords, and playing by America's rules. (Not that I have anything against Israel.)
The military stepped in to broker a deal with Morsi last week, after millions of Egyptians protested against him. Morsi refused to negotiate or compromise on all the undemocratic changes he made this year, so the military united with all political and religious parties, as well as the courts, to come up with a plan to get Egypt back on track, in response to the voices on the streets. What we witnessed was democracy in action, not a coup, and I admire the military for taking on that role.
But through all of this, everyone is looking for someone to blame. The only people I find myself able to blame are the Egyptians who voted Morsi into power. Not the US, not the Egyptian military. The Egyptians who overlooked his loyalty to the MB, the history of the MB, his lack of political experience, his obvious lack of class or charisma... But voted for him anyway. This is all their faults.
They should have had more foresight, they should have been more realistic. They should have anticipated these outcomes. They cannot now, a year later, throw a tantrum because they realized they made a mistake, and now want him removed.
They gave these terrorists the power they wanted for generations, and now that they've decided to take it back, they expect the MBs to just comply? They will fight, they will kill, they will terrorize. And it's all the voters' faults. The rest of us living here have to deal with the consequences of their actions in voting him in.
Don't blame the US, don't blame the military, don't blame the police. They were their votes that gave them the power. They were their cries that took it away.
This is the consequence of giving democracy to a terrorist dictator. His supporters are largely illiterate. His supporters are largely poor. They don't know the difference between a constitution they can't read, and religious manipulation. They don't know the difference between dictatorship and democracy, because dictatorship is all they have ever known. Yet the voters gave them the upper hand, and they won't let go of that now.
My fiancé made a great analogy while trying to calm my frustrations down. Egypt is like a septic tank. Like a waste dump. Egypt is underground in this waste collecting tank, while the rest of the world is living above ground, with fresh air and sunshine. Everyone here is living in shit, and shit is what they're used to. Sometimes, instead of shit, some urine comes down the waste pipe, offering a false reprieve. 'Yes! Piss! Not shit!' But at the end of the day, it is still piss. And while you might think the urine is better than the shit- it will turn out to be just as bad or even worse: Diarrhea.
That is how Morsi got elected.
