dna edit: Egypt’s broken promise

Former defence minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s victory in the recently concluded Egyptian elections marks another turn of the wheel returning the country to its pre-Arab Spring political landscape. The Egyptian media has, by and large, declared the election result a landslide victory for him, and by one measure, it is. With around 94 per cent of the votes cast, he left his only rival, Hamdeen Sabahi, to mop up a meagre 3 per cent, while the remaining votes were declared void. But take a step back, and the picture changes. Seen in the light of his pre-election declaration that he wanted 40 million votes, the low turnout of 46 per cent or a little over 24 million voters undercuts his claim to a widespread mandate. Nor can the elections truly be considered free and fair; from the Egyptian media shilling for him and non-voters being threatened with fines to numerous allegations of voter turnout statistics being inflated, there is plenty to question. Taken together with the challenges that await him, this does not bode well for Egypt’s immediate future as a democracy.

Sisi’s plan of action regarding how to manage Egypt’s fractured polity and economic woes remain largely unknown. But whatever they are, he will have to get cracking soon. The problems at the top of his list — widespread corruption and high unemployment, both exacerbated by a yawning budget deficit — were among the factors that fuelled the original Arab Spring uprising against Hosni Mubarak in 2011. Given the messianic image he has crafted, he will have to show quick results on these fronts. But the answers are likely to be painful ones. For one, he will have to cut energy subsidies if he wants to reduce the deficit.

That will not sit well with the man on the street, while the business community won’t be happy with the tax reforms he has hinted at. And the tribal leaders who delivered the rural vote to him will expect returns on their investment he might not be able to deliver given Egypt’s vast urban-rural divide.

Sisi is, in short, between a very large rock and a very hard place. Given his political antecedents and his modus operandi so far, that points to the depressing probability of his looking to the military — the most efficient state institution and largely free of civilian oversight under the new constitution — to play a larger role, both in civilian spheres and in maintaining his regime. It would be the final step in the re-entrenchment of the military, bureaucratic and business elite known as the deep state that has underwritten his predecessors, whether it was Mubarak or Mohamed Morsi.

Real political opposition could upset this dynamic, but it seems unlikely to emerge in the current scenario. The Muslim Brotherhood has been driven deep underground, not just in Egypt but in West Asia as a whole. The Nour Party, the only Islamist political faction still in play, is meanwhile quiescent, taking care not to antagonise Sisi. That’s not to say Sisi’s opponents couldn’t gain traction in the future; putting the genie of mass politicisation back in the bottle is a tall order even for an authoritarian regime. But as matters stand, Egypt’s combination of weak civilian infrastructure, a deeply entrenched elite and a powerful military is showing why the Arab Spring countries have a long, difficult path ahead to fulfilling 2011’s promise.