Saturday, November 19, 2011

On the verge of elections (III)

Yesterday, Friday, the biggest demonstrations for months took place in Cairo. The demonstrators were supported by several cities all over the country. Their demand was a swift handover of power by the military to an elected civil government and presidential elections before April 2012.

At first, the Islamists were present (directly after the Friday prayers) but then, all colour of activists, civilians and political groups joined them. Towards evening, the crowd has swollen to 50’000.

Most of them left Tahrir Square at night, but some activists stayed overnight.

Today Saturday, police and central security forces dispersed them violently. As soon as they had left, demonstrators came back from all sides, all kind of groups. Now we are close to midnight and people are still moving to Tahrir. Same is happening in the most important cities all over Egypt. Presidential candidates are joining the demonstrators and supporting them – seizing the opportunity.

The police are interfering with little restraint, as usual; several journalists have been injured and being robbed of their equipment, one has lost an eye. The number of injured is rising constantly and is said to be near 600.

Can’t get it out of my mind anymore… Is it the second big uprising? Egyptians are more than fed up. Since Mubarak has been toppled, everything went wrong. The 25 January aims have been boycotted… Do Egyptians stand up once more united, Islamists and Seculars? Will the parliamentary elections take place at all? Today’s demonstrations will have consequences…




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