“No one could be seen on the streets on Wednesday, not only in Cairo where the trial took place, but also in provincial cities, as everyone was anxious to watch the court proceedings involving their former leader,” political analyst Hasan Tahsin said.
Despite being Ramadan, coffee houses in Cairo were open during the day to facilitate people to watch the trial on televisions.
“It is the right of the people to take away the power that they conferred upon him,” Tahsin said, contrasting Mubarak’s former grandeur and current helplessness.
He congratulated the Supreme Military Council for its efforts to dispense justice to all without discrimination whether he was an ordinary citizen or occupying a top post.
He also commended the council for going ahead with the trial without yielding to any external pressure.
He also stressed the need to return the public wealth stolen from Egypt.
“The trial will widen the distance between supporters of the Jan. 25 revolution and those of the old regime,” finance consultant Ahmad Othman, an Egyptian expatriate based in Riyadh, told Arab News.
He said he did not like sit-ins that affected public life but he supported a fair trial of the former president so that he had a chance to state his case or be punished.
Egyptian media person Amal Ibrahim said the public trial of Mubarak is a clear signal to anyone who misuses power that he or she will be brought to justice one day.
“The trial ushers in a new phase in the Jan. 25 revolution. I believe it will bring peace and discipline to our streets. It will also pacify relatives of the activists who were killed during the revolution and also others unjustly killed by the regime,” Amal said.
She also noted that people preferred to watch the trial rather than the Ramadan serials on television.
Egyptian engineer in Riyadh Saleh Mahmoud said the trial put to rest accusations made by some writers that the authorities had some secret agenda with regard to the former dictator and his cronies.
Deputy Chief Editor of Egyptian Al-Gomhuriah newspaper Muhammad Al-Fawal said the sight of the Mubarak on a hospital bed in a cage in the courtroom during the month of Ramadan would have been aimed at swaying public sentiment toward the former president. “However, it created the opposite reaction. When questions were asked Mubarak gave answers betraying his supposed mental and physical unfitness. On the other hand, when questions were asked about the charges against him, he appeared not to hear them. The television scenes prove that he was not weak or in poor health,” he said.
