President in Egypt with lesser power
I have been trying to understand the details of the current dispute over the presidential powers in Egypt. It appears that the underlying cause of the issue is a lack of trust between the involved parties.
The Muslim Brotherhood and most other political powers believe that the present military rulers are scheming to check the Parliament by dissolving it, thus preventing it from making constitutional amendments.
On the other hand, the generals believe that the Brotherhood has a hidden plan to seize all governmental powers, including the presidency, and bring the Parliament and the Consultative Council under its control.
The military rulers probably believe that leaving the country in the hands of the Brotherhood with all the legislative and executive institutions and powers, including the control of police and military forces is a bad idea. It might prompt the Brotherhood to occupy the government perpetually as is happening in Iran and Gaza.
Currently, the presidential office is vacant, waiting for the announcement of the final election results. Each of the contestants, Muhammad Mursi and Ahmed Shafiq has claimed victory.
One wonders who will win — the candidate of the Brotherhood or the military. Or is the country heading for a fresh revolution or a military coup?
The Brotherhood said, however, that the top office has become less attractive to it as many of the presidential powers have been clipped. It wants an all-powerful president.
Let us examine what powers will be denied to a future Egyptian president.
As far as I know, the military rulers took away the president’s status as the supreme commander of the armed forces. This means a president will not have the authority to declare war or change the command structure of the military. A future president or prime minister will also be denied the authority to appoint a defense minister and decide the military budget.
Still, the president will retrain his authority to choose his prime minister, ministers and senior officials of the state and will represent the country internally and abroad and, of course, he will control all state affairs.
However, an attempt of military rulers to seize any of the presidential powers is, undoubtedly, a threat to the concept of a civilian state. It may eventually lead to a situation in which the military enhances its authority and cling to governmental power indefinitely. It is also feared that parties with an ideological base, such as the Brotherhood, might not respect the independence of governmental institutions and insist on imposing their sovereignty in the name of the majority they received in elections.
Turkey, and before that Spain, have passed through a stage of bitter power struggle between military and civilian institutions for government control. In the end they succeeded in becoming civilian states and both sides respect the democratic rules of the game. Sudan has been taking a different course. The military in that country overturned the elected government under Al-Sadiq Al-Mahdi. They misled the people to believe that the country had plunged into a state of anarchy, so the military was prompted to seize power to save the people. The military in Sudan also promised to return to barracks after a short while when things returned to normalcy. But still, even after 30 years, the military is clinging onto power.
In the case of Iran, the ideology-based fascist party of Khomeinists has been in power over the past 40 years. The party has remained in power in the name of religion and banished all opposition.
So, the Egyptians are caught between two jaws — the ideological Brotherhood, which is feared to rule in the name of religion and the military rulers, who may or may not hand over the power to civilians.
The political and legal conflict involving the common man in Egypt is good as long no one resorts to guns. It is good for Egyptians to find a balance between the two powers so that neither could take and keep all powers.
According to the new regulation, the upcoming president will not have any power over the armed forces and the military will not have any power over the civilian government. This was the way the power was balanced in Turkey, which finally led to a reasonable solution.
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