Article by: JEFFREY FLEISHMAN , Los Angeles Times
Updated: May 19, 2012 - 7:09 PM
For many voters, Egypt's landmark presidential election should focus on restoring nation's prosperity, not religion.
CAIRO - Adham Bishr said Egypt's next president should give him a job, not tell him how to worship God.
Men gathered around Bishr in a scrap of shade by the Nile, arguing over inflation and politics before disappearing into the grit and anger of a neighborhood at Cairo's edge. The men, mostly unemployed drivers, mill hands and laborers, want work; their sons, college students with dim prospects, wonder whether the future will bring enough money to take a wife.
"I don't care about how much Islam is in the government," said Bishr, laid off years ago from a sugar factory. Before that, during decades when Egypt paid unlivable wages, he built roads in Iraq and welded metal in Saudi Arabia. "I want a president who will rebuild our country. We need to rise again to greatness."
Egypt is hobbled by economic turmoil, poor health care, failing social programs and lack of security. The top candidates in the presidential election that begins Wednesday have addressed these concerns, but the issues have often been eclipsed by passion over how deeply Islam should permeate a new constitution and government.
Start of a new era
The election will set the trajectory and tenor of an untested political Islam emerging from more than a year of Arab uprisings. It's a struggle between ultraconservatives and liberals over whether Egypt should lean toward the fundamentalism of Saudi Arabia or the moderate inclinations of Turkey. The discourse is driven by influential scholars and clerics who invoke piety as a political barometer.
Most Egyptians agree that Islam should guide national policy. But men like Bishr -- more than 40 percent of Egyptians live on less than $2 a day -- fear that the elite's preoccupation with religion and talk of reviving centuries-old caliphates are diversions from the country's entrenched problems. Such sentiment is shared miles away in cafes frequented by the young professionals.
"We need to get the economy on its feet," said Shady Ghoneim, an electronics importer who supports leading secular candidate Amr Moussa. "Foreign investors won't come back unless they can trust a moderate president."
The landmark vote promises to end an era of autocratic rule that began in 1952, when Gamal Abdel Nasser led a military coup that freed Egypt from colonial rule. Since then, the nation has known only military men as its presidents. The question is whether the Arab world's most populous state is prepared to deliver an Islamist to the palace.
The choices Egyptians face among the top candidates are clear and symbolize the contentiousness over how to move beyond the legacy of Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted last year. Moussa, a former foreign minister, promises to offer a secular balance against a parliament controlled by Islamists. He is challenged by Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, a liberal Islamist straining to appease moderate and ultraconservative sensibilities, and Muslim Brotherhood hopeful Mohamed Morsi, who has veered toward hard-line clerics.
Prosperity denied
Morsi's place of third or fourth in the polls indicates that respondents, about 40 percent of whom say they are undecided, are suspicious of the Brotherhood and seek a candidate less driven by religious dogma than enshrining a civil state. That's true for Bishr and the men of the Tora neighborhood, which echoes with tales of prosperity denied.
Bishr took part in last year's uprising in Tahrir Square. Most of his friends did not, and Tora, like many working-class and poor neighborhoods, watched from the outskirts as history unfolded. Parents here hustle for handyman jobs and subsidized bread; they want Egypt kept out of wars and enough household money to fix broken shutters and sagging walls.
"The poor should be the first priority," said one man. "Egyptians are merciful," said another. "We already have Islam in our hearts."
http://www.startribune.com/nation/152161475.html
Updated: May 19, 2012 - 7:09 PM
For many voters, Egypt's landmark presidential election should focus on restoring nation's prosperity, not religion.
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An Egyptian woman stands in front of a mural depicting military ruler Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, on the left side of the face and ousted president Hosni Mubarak, right side, in Cairo, Egypt, Saturday, May 19, 2012. Egyptians are for the first time freely electing their president starting May 23-24.
Photo: Manu Brabo, Associated Press
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CAIRO - Adham Bishr said Egypt's next president should give him a job, not tell him how to worship God.
Men gathered around Bishr in a scrap of shade by the Nile, arguing over inflation and politics before disappearing into the grit and anger of a neighborhood at Cairo's edge. The men, mostly unemployed drivers, mill hands and laborers, want work; their sons, college students with dim prospects, wonder whether the future will bring enough money to take a wife.
"I don't care about how much Islam is in the government," said Bishr, laid off years ago from a sugar factory. Before that, during decades when Egypt paid unlivable wages, he built roads in Iraq and welded metal in Saudi Arabia. "I want a president who will rebuild our country. We need to rise again to greatness."
Egypt is hobbled by economic turmoil, poor health care, failing social programs and lack of security. The top candidates in the presidential election that begins Wednesday have addressed these concerns, but the issues have often been eclipsed by passion over how deeply Islam should permeate a new constitution and government.
Start of a new era
The election will set the trajectory and tenor of an untested political Islam emerging from more than a year of Arab uprisings. It's a struggle between ultraconservatives and liberals over whether Egypt should lean toward the fundamentalism of Saudi Arabia or the moderate inclinations of Turkey. The discourse is driven by influential scholars and clerics who invoke piety as a political barometer.
Most Egyptians agree that Islam should guide national policy. But men like Bishr -- more than 40 percent of Egyptians live on less than $2 a day -- fear that the elite's preoccupation with religion and talk of reviving centuries-old caliphates are diversions from the country's entrenched problems. Such sentiment is shared miles away in cafes frequented by the young professionals.
"We need to get the economy on its feet," said Shady Ghoneim, an electronics importer who supports leading secular candidate Amr Moussa. "Foreign investors won't come back unless they can trust a moderate president."
The landmark vote promises to end an era of autocratic rule that began in 1952, when Gamal Abdel Nasser led a military coup that freed Egypt from colonial rule. Since then, the nation has known only military men as its presidents. The question is whether the Arab world's most populous state is prepared to deliver an Islamist to the palace.
The choices Egyptians face among the top candidates are clear and symbolize the contentiousness over how to move beyond the legacy of Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted last year. Moussa, a former foreign minister, promises to offer a secular balance against a parliament controlled by Islamists. He is challenged by Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, a liberal Islamist straining to appease moderate and ultraconservative sensibilities, and Muslim Brotherhood hopeful Mohamed Morsi, who has veered toward hard-line clerics.
Prosperity denied
Morsi's place of third or fourth in the polls indicates that respondents, about 40 percent of whom say they are undecided, are suspicious of the Brotherhood and seek a candidate less driven by religious dogma than enshrining a civil state. That's true for Bishr and the men of the Tora neighborhood, which echoes with tales of prosperity denied.
Bishr took part in last year's uprising in Tahrir Square. Most of his friends did not, and Tora, like many working-class and poor neighborhoods, watched from the outskirts as history unfolded. Parents here hustle for handyman jobs and subsidized bread; they want Egypt kept out of wars and enough household money to fix broken shutters and sagging walls.
"The poor should be the first priority," said one man. "Egyptians are merciful," said another. "We already have Islam in our hearts."
http://www.startribune.com/nation/152161475.html
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