Interviews with Sally Sami

I was asked by Amnesty to go to Tunisia. I was supposed to be there before [former Tunisian President Zine El Abidine] Ben Ali ran. But I had to stay for personal reasons. But then I went a day after Ben Ali fled, spent a week in Tunisia, went around. And the more time I spent in Tunisia, the more convinced I was that this would never happen in Egypt. The society in Tunisia is not as complex as the Egyptian where there´s no big sectarian division.

It is mainly an economic division. People of Tunisia, even though the poor– if anything Ben Ali did was he kept the education. And nearly everyone in Tunisia is very well educated, even those who are living in poverty. It was just– you know, and I went to slums in the poor areas, in the internal areas of Tunisia. And I met young Tunisians who were very proud of the revolution. And they were very sophisticated. And I was like, “This is not in Egypt.” You know, we don´t have this. If you went to a slum area in Egypt– I feel ashamed, yeah, for thinking so.

Tunisia was an inspiration, of course. And Tunisia played a very important role. And we Egyptians always thought we pioneered. We take the lead. But it was basically this. Everyone in the region saw Egypt as needing– whether when it comes to resistance or when it comes to negative policies, and if the Egyptian government issues a law that restricts more freedoms, other countries they have the right to do so also in the region here. For it to– it was a slap in the face that the Tunisians proceeded. But also, the Tunisians taught us that things can happen. It can actually happen.

Sally Sami has been a human rights defender for nearly a decade. She was one of the main coordinators of the Front to Defend Egypt’s Protesters (FDEP) during the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Sami continues to defend human rights, but has become involved in politics and currently is a leading member of the Egyptian Social Democratic Party and has been elected its Secretary General for Civil Society Affairs.

Twitter: @salamander 

With a history dating back to the 10th millennium B.C., Egypt has long played a central role in the Middle East. Egypt is the largest Arab nation and has an influential voice in Arabic and Middle Eastern culture. Egypt has a diverse economy, but has struggled to create sustained economic growth and opportunities for its population of 84 million people.

The country has little experience with representative democracy. From 1956 to 1970, President Gamal Abdel Nasser ruled Egypt with a strong hand, nationalizing the Suez Canal and taking the country into conflict with the new state of Israel. Upon his death, Anwar al-Sadat became president. Together with other Arab nations, Sadat launched the October War against Israel in 1973. In 1979, Sadat signed a groundbreaking peace treaty with Israel.

From Sadat’s assassination in 1981 until the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, Egypt was governed by President Hosni Mubarak. For all of Mubarak’s time in office, and for much of the time since his resignation, Egypt has been under “Emergency Law,” which allows the government to suspend constitutional rights, including limiting political activity and restricting free speech. Emergency Law also allows the government to use summary arrests against political opponents.

For four successive terms, Mubarak was reelected in referenda without an opponent. In 2005, under domestic and international pressure, Mubarak proposed a constitutional amendment to allow Egypt’s first multicandidate presidential elections. Because the amendment would have imposed severe restrictions on the eligibility of opposition candidates, opposition groups boycotted the vote. Mubarak claimed to have won the September 2005 presidential election with an official 88 percent of the vote, amid widespread allegations of fraud and vote rigging. The main opposition leader, Ayman Nour, was subsequently prosecuted by the government for forging signatures on petitions and was sentenced to five years in prison, provoking protests from the United States and other democratic countries.

Following the example of the Tunisian Revolution, large protests swept Egypt in early 2011. The military, led by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), withdrew its support of Mubarak. On February 11, 2011, Vice President Omar Suleiman announced that Mubarak had resigned. The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) headed by Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi then assumed power in Egypt. SCAF dissolved the parliament and suspended the constitution.

In November 2011, Egypt held parliamentary elections that were reportedly fair and democratic. In June 2012, Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohamed Morsi was elected President, in part because liberal and secular forces failed to coalesce around a single candidate. Morsi’s popularity declined as he declared his orders immune from challenge, removed judicial review processes, and was accused of taking steps towards the implementation of Islamist policies. Conflict arose between those supporting Islamist policies and those seeking a more liberal and secular government. Protests occurred throughout his presidency until Morsi was ousted by the military in July 2013. Muslim Brotherhood leaders were arrested and their camps and offices raided. Until new elections are held, a SCAF-installed provisional government led by acting President Adly Mansour is in control.

In its most recent report, the independent watchdog group Freedom House classifies Egypt as “partly free.” On its scale where 1 is the most free and 7is the least free, Egypt earned scores of 5 in both the civil liberties and political rights categories.