MAYBE THEIR SPHYNX KNOWS
(…how a democratic system is supposed to work)

When the exhilarating breezes of the Arab Spring finally blew into Egypt,  its people greeted these by rising up in massive waves of protests to rid themselves of the long-time authoritarian rule of Hosni Mubarak (from a long line of pharaoh-type autocrats such as Nasser, Sadat, etc.), and calling for a “democratic” system to replace him instead.

Meanwhile, they accepted the Army as their interim authority to maintain law and order, and otherwise keep the machinery of government working in its usual decrepit and corrupt working order, while they stampeded themselves through the ”democratic” process of mounting provincial and national elections, complete with all the trimmings of …political parties…  and campaign rhetoric…to culminate with masses of voters happily stuffing their voting slips into ballot boxes, etc., etc.. Even the formerly outlawed Muslim Brotherhood was allowed to participate. Egypt was being reborn into a new civil and democratic society and euphoria flowed along with the waters of the Nile.

Alas! Things didn’t quite work out the way they should have. For one thing, once it had its mitts on the levers of power, the Army was reluctant to let loose of them. Worse yet, while adept at running military operations, it was doing a lousy job of running the government. For another, in all the campaigning hullabaloo that went on, only the Muslim Brotherhood was organized and slickly smiley-faced enough to convince their fellow Egyptians to give them enough of a working majority to take hold of the levers of power. For the first time in some 5000 years the Egyptians now had themselves a legitimate democratically elected President and government.

But now, less than a year later, the Egyptians have come to realize that the “democratic” process had delivered something less than what had been advertised during the election process.. Instead of waiting until the next voting cycle to come around to fix those shortcomings, however, our Egyptian friends have come up with a new way to express the voice of the people. It’s this: If you’re not happy about what your hands did for you at the ballot box, use your feet to riot in the streets to demand a do-over.

Which raises an interesting question: Do the Egyptians understand how a democratic system is supposed to work? Maybe their Sphinx knows.

CENTURION