Egypt has a brand new constitution, one that explicitly addresses the need to preserve human rights and freedoms, a clearly better one than the previous constitutions. Also, the front-runner to become Egypt's next president is Field Marshall Abd ElFattah El-Sisi, a patriotic, decent and well-intentioned man, an exemplary credit to Egypt.
This is very positive news. However, a better future can only be a promise at this time, far from certain. Many generations have come and gone without an Egyptian regime (government, people's assembly and judiciary) that believes and fundamentally understands the wisdom and value to a nation of seeking to establish and honor freedoms, privacy and human rights. To date, there has not been a regime in Egypt that respects the nation's constitution of its time, and abides by its articles. There has not been a regime that interacts with the Egyptian people, not as irrelevant children, but as fellow citizens invested in the nation's welfare.
But, considering that these regimes do not materialize out of thin air, they are the product of the Egyptian society. Well, for the man/woman on the street, in the remotest of villages, small towns and large cities, the record is largely abysmal in regards understanding that trampling all over other people's rights and liberties is not one of his/her rights.
It is remarkable how difficult, bordering on impossible, it has been in recent memory in Egypt for:
It is remarkable how difficult, bordering on impossible, it has been in recent memory in Egypt for:
- A government to understand the significance of Abraham Lincoln's statement "Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth," heed it and strive to be that kind of government.
- A man to understand that he is not superior to a woman, only different anatomy.
- A Muslim to understand that he is not superior to a human of any other religion or of no religion at all, only a different faith.
- The rich to understand that he is not superior to the poor, only more fortunate.
- The old to understand he is not superior to the young, perhaps more wise.
- An Egyptian born to two Egyptians to understand she is not superior to an Egyptian born to an Egyptian father and a Greek mother, only missing out on acquiring with ease a second language.
- The populace at large to understand that a guest of the country, visiting or working, is to be honored, maybe learned from, not ridiculed or harassed.
Education
Education is the answer, the only answer. Education is an indispensable tool for all of humanity. Education is not simply learning how to read, write and add numbers, it is not a college degree or a PhD, it is thoroughly comprehending the many facts of life, from the mundane to the challenging, as gleaned from economics, science as well as the evolution of mankind. It is awareness of how the world turns, what makes developed countries developed, what living priorities are and that it is not preordained for some to be deprived of a fulfilling life. It is a lifetime process, one that a vast majority of humans, including me, will not complete in time, but the pursuit is so worth it.
An educated people produce what is useful to humanity. Below link is a first-rate exhibit of this sound concept. It is about the inspiring and amazing story of the crusade of a school dropout from a poor family in southern India to revolutionize menstrual health for rural women in developing countries by inventing a simple machine they can use to make cheap sanitary pads. The man, Arunachalam Muruganantham, is an educated human, he figured out a solution to one of life's priorities, for the other gender no less, navigating his way through the many taboos around menstruation in India.
Pluralism is an ideology that needs to take root soon in all of the Arab world. As Marwan Muasher, a former Jordanian foreign minister, argues in his extremely relevant new book The Second Arab Awakening and the Battle for Pluralism, "No sustainable progress will be possible without the ethic of pluralism permeating all aspects of Arab society — pluralism of thought, pluralism in gender opportunities, pluralism in respect to other religions, pluralism in education, pluralism toward minorities, pluralism of political parties rotating in power and pluralism in the sense of everyone’s right to think differently from the collective."
Education affords the individual enlightenment, better self-confidence, a view onto a future full of possibilities, making own choices, having varied opportunities, providing for future generations, etc., etc., etc. Through it all, educated people get to see the world around them, not as a zero-sum game, but potentially a win-win existence.
Education affords the individual enlightenment, better self-confidence, a view onto a future full of possibilities, making own choices, having varied opportunities, providing for future generations, etc., etc., etc. Through it all, educated people get to see the world around them, not as a zero-sum game, but potentially a win-win existence.
Education contributes mightily to the betterment of humans, including the acceptance of the "others." Simply contemplate these words:
- "Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe." - H.G. Wells, The Outline of History.
- "We have come out of the time when obedience, the acceptance of discipline, intelligent courage and resolution, were most important, into that more difficult time when it is a person's duty to understand the world rather than simply fight for it." - Ernest Hemingway.
- "Today the world is the victim of propaganda because people are not intellectually competent. More than anything the United States needs effective citizens competent to do their own thinking." - William Mather Lewis.
- "Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppression of body and mind will vanish like the evil spirits at the dawn of day." - Thomas Jefferson.
Education being critical for any given nation is inarguable. I refer here to some of the results of the United Nations' largest global survey ever, just released on February 20, 2014. The survey will continue until 2015. People from all around the world were asked which six factors, out of 16 possibilities, would improve their lives and those of their families. So far, there is one clear result from the survey: People want better education. Pretty much every way you play around with the data collected thus far, education takes the top spot -- a total of two-thirds of respondents have listed it as one of their top priorities. Below link for full UN report:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
(see whole article at bottom)
Education in Egypt
The importance of education is no different for Egyptians. The answer for Egypt, I submit, is a thorough reform of the education system, from kindergarten, all the way through college, and into public life. No need to reinvent the wheel, curricula should be modeled after nations known for the quality of their education systems. In the Internet age that should not be a problem to discern. In a nutshell, the curricula at all levels of education, including the one for public consumption, should simply be geared to transform the character of the population, to be one that is fit to live and thrive in today's world, to have people the world over live in their midst, or conversely they living in the midst of other people worldwide, not in insecurity and confrontation, but rather tolerance, harmony, integration and assimilation.
It is strikingly ironic that not so distant in the past, Egypt sparkled with many ethnic minorities, including Jews, Greeks, Armenians, Italians and others from Europe and elsewhere. They called Egypt home. Walking the streets of Cairo and Alexandria, one could sense the country bubbling with excitement. Today, save for Egyptian Coptics, who are facing a constant state of fear for their lives and their livelihoods, they all are almost gone. Today, the country has become dangerously homogeneous, denied the natural infusion of diverse thoughts, ideas and efforts, threatened with stagnation deep into the future.
At this juncture in Egypt's evolution, such an enormous undertaking must come from a savvy, competent and dedicated leadership, top-down. In due time, the Egyptian people as a whole will join in this gigantic effort and contribute to complete the task, bottom-up. Patriotism asks for nothing less from rulers and the people.
Therefore, in my opinion, until education makes serious inroads in Egypt, producing an educated society, optimism and positiveness in regards the 2014 Constitution, or Field Marshall Abd ElFattah El-Sisi becoming the next president of Egypt, is premature. The jury should remain out for a while longer.
The 2014 Constitution
One must wait and see if, in real life and not just on paper, the next regime will be an educated one, made of:
- a prescient and courageous government, capable and accountable to initiate a culture makeover throughout the nation,
- a people's assembly that is not merely a set of warm bodies that votes as directed, but responsible to legislate a life based on universal human rights, the rule of law, science and technology, and
- a judiciary that is independent and authoritative, thus capable of upholding the constitution and seeing to it that the rule of law is once and for eternity the norm in the land of the pharaohs.
Only then, Egypt, via its regime and people, will stand a chance to put in practice, ultimately etch in stone, the various human rights contained in the constitution, including:
- freedom of religion
- freedom of the press
- freedom of expression
- rule of law, and how it is practiced on the ground for ALL Egyptians
- respect for privacy
- rights of the downtrodden and woe-begotten, particularly women and the young
It is a fact of life in developing nations for progress in regards human rights to be delayed somewhat, and in some countries for what seems like eternity, but it must never be stopped altogether.
Fourteen years into the 21st century, a modern nation must be fully committed to end discrimination within its borders in any form against any person because of
race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, sexual orientation or other social status. This is hard even for the most advanced nations to achieve, but not insurmountable in an educated nation to make gradual progress in that regard.
Below please find an article by Rana Allam that sheds light on issues with the new constitution
(see whole article at bottom):
El-Sisi for President
appoint him president. The qualifications and skills set required to run a nation with such a complex array of issues facing it, are totally different from his own hard-earned experience and expertise.
In time, as education takes a tangible hold at the grassroots level throughout the nation, Egyptians will be in a position to make the right choice of their leadership on a consistent basis. In the meantime, they can only hope that El-Sisi is of the prerequisite character. I am reminded of what Abraham Lincoln once said "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."
We will soon discover the content of El-Sisi's character. Will he be the Egyptian citizen El-Sisi or another representative, a flag-bearer of sort, of a military regime that has miserably failed Egypt for 60+ years, and counting? Will he in time rein in the military, bring it under civilian control, curbing in the process its ill-gained and unfair benefits and perks, its damaging
dominance over the nation's political and socio-economic landscape? Will he form a capable government intent on effectively addressing the needs of the far too many disadvantaged Egyptians, and not just lip-service like all of his predecessors? Will his government understand that creating opportunities for the poor is the obligation of the state? Nations are lauded, their people happy, not only because they have a powerful military, not only because they have so many millionaires, not only because they have a strong middle class, all of which are definite goals to achieve, but for the ways and means they
care for the weak and the needy; this is what makes a nation truly great, admired and envied the world over.
We will soon discover the content of El-Sisi's character. Will he be the Egyptian citizen El-Sisi or another representative, a flag-bearer of sort, of a military regime that has miserably failed Egypt for 60+ years, and counting? Will he in time rein in the military, bring it under civilian control, curbing in the process its ill-gained and unfair benefits and perks, its damaging
dominance over the nation's political and socio-economic landscape? Will he form a capable government intent on effectively addressing the needs of the far too many disadvantaged Egyptians, and not just lip-service like all of his predecessors? Will his government understand that creating opportunities for the poor is the obligation of the state? Nations are lauded, their people happy, not only because they have a powerful military, not only because they have so many millionaires, not only because they have a strong middle class, all of which are definite goals to achieve, but for the ways and means they
In Closing
Realistically speaking, and in all fairness, without useful information, the odds are stacked against the general public to know better, then, now and looking over the horizon. In a country where half the women cannot read, expecting elections to yield constructive and remedial results is nothing short of a sardonic act toward the Egyptian people.
Only an educated Egypt can:
- Mount the herculean effort required to tackle the following areas:
- economy
- tourism
- security
- inflation
- public facilities
- and deal with the following slew of issues:
- terrorism
- middle class struggles
- corruption
- costs associated with the 2011 and 2013 revolutions
- chaos, costs and disruptions associated with sit-ins, labor strikes, protests and demonstrations
- pollution
- rumors and conspiracies
I look to Father Time, before too many more generations come and go, to make world-class education a core value in Egypt. Only then, will my concern become history.
Hussein
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The Indian sanitary pad revolutionary
By Vibeke VenemaBBC World Service
A school dropout from a poor family in southern India has revolutionised menstrual health for rural women in developing countries by inventing a simple machine they can use to make cheap sanitary pads.
Arunachalam Muruganantham's invention came at great personal cost - he nearly lost his family, his money and his place in society. But he kept his sense of humour.
"It all started with my wife," he says. In 1998 he was newly married and his world revolved around his wife, Shanthi, and his widowed mother. One day he saw Shanthi was hiding something from him. He was shocked to discover what it was - rags, "nasty cloths" which she used during menstruation.
"I will be honest," says Muruganantham. "I would not even use it to clean my scooter." When he asked her why she didn't use sanitary pads, she pointed out that if she bought them for the women in the family, she wouldn't be able to afford to buy milk or run the household.
Wanting to impress his young wife, Muruganantham went into town to buy her a sanitary pad. It was handed to him hurriedly, as if it were contraband. He weighed it in his hand and wondered why 10g (less than 0.5oz) of cotton, which at the time cost 10 paise (£0.001), should sell for 4 rupees (£0.04) - 40 times the price. He decided he could make them cheaper himself.
He fashioned a sanitary pad out of cotton and gave it to Shanthi, demanding immediate feedback. She said he'd have to wait for some time - only then did he realise that periods were monthly. "I can't wait a month for each feedback, it'll take two decades!" He needed more volunteers.
When Muruganantham looked into it further, he discovered that hardly any women in the surrounding villages used sanitary pads - fewer than one in 10. His findings were echoed by a 2011 survey by AC Nielsen, commissioned by the Indian government, which found that only 12% of women across India use sanitary pads.
Muruganantham says that in rural areas, the take-up is far less than that. He was shocked to learn that women don't just use old rags, but other unhygienic substances such as sand, sawdust, leaves and even ash.
Women who do use cloths are often too embarrassed to dry them in the sun, which means they don't get disinfected. Approximately 70% of all reproductive diseases in India are caused by poor menstrual hygiene - it can also affect maternal mortality.Muruganantham says that in rural areas, the take-up is far less than that. He was shocked to learn that women don't just use old rags, but other unhygienic substances such as sand, sawdust, leaves and even ash.
The documentary Menstrual Man follows Muruganantham as he installs his machines across India
Finding volunteers to test his products was no mean feat. His sisters refused, so he had the idea of approaching female students at his local medical college. "But how can a workshop worker approach a medical college girl?" Muruganantham says. "Not even college boys can go near these girls!"
He managed to convince 20 students to try out his pads - but it still didn't quite work out. On the day he came to collect their feedback sheets he caught three of the girls industriously filling them all in. These results obviously could not be relied on. It was then that he decided to test the products on himself. "I became the man who wore a sanitary pad," he says.
He created a "uterus" from a football bladder by punching a couple of holes in it, and filling it with goat's blood. A former classmate, a butcher, would ring his bicycle bell outside the house whenever he was going to kill a goat. Muruganantham would collect the blood and mix in an additive he got from another friend at a blood bank to prevent it clotting too quickly - but it didn't stop the smell.
He walked, cycled and ran with the football bladder under his traditional clothes, constantly pumping blood out to test his sanitary pad's absorption rates. Everyone thought he'd gone mad.
He used to wash his bloodied clothes at a public well and the whole village concluded he had a sexual disease. Friends crossed the road to avoid him. "I had become a pervert," he says. At the same time, his wife got fed up - and left. "So you see God's sense of humour," he says in the documentary Menstrual Man by Amit Virmani. "I'd started the research for my wife and after 18 months she left me!"
Then he had another brainwave - he would study used sanitary pads: surely this would reveal everything. This idea posed an even greater risk in such a superstitious community. "Even if I ask for a hair from a lady, she would suspect I am doing some black magic on her to mesmerise her," he says.
He supplied his group of medical students with sanitary pads and collected them afterwards. He laid his haul out in the back yard to study, only for his mother to stumble across the grisly scene one afternoon. It was the final straw. She cried, put her sari on the ground, put her belongings into it, and left. "It was a problem for me," he says. "I had to cook my own food."
Worse was to come. The villagers became convinced he was possessed by evil spirits, and were about to chain him upside down to a tree to be "healed" by the local soothsayer. He only narrowly avoided this treatment by agreeing to leave the village. It was a terrible price to pay. "My wife gone, my mum gone, ostracised by my village" he says. "I was left all alone in life."
Still, he carried on. The biggest mystery was what successful sanitary pads were made of. He had sent some off for laboratory analysis and reports came back that it was cotton, but his own cotton creations did not work. It was something he could only ask the multinational companies who produced sanitary products - but how? "It's like knocking on the door of Coke and saying, 'Can I ask you how your cola is manufactured?'"
Muruganantham wrote to the big manufacturing companies with the help of a college professor, whom he repaid by doing domestic work - he didn't speak much English at the time. He also spent almost 7,000 rupees (£70) on telephone calls - money he didn't have. "When I got through, they asked me what kind of plant I had," he says. "I didn't really understand what they meant."
In the end, he said he was a textile mill owner in Coimbatore who was thinking of moving into the business, and requested some samples. A few weeks later, mysterious hard boards appeared in the mail - cellulose, from the bark of a tree. It had taken two years and three months to discover what sanitary pads are made of, but there was a snag - the machine required to break this material down and turn it into pads cost many thousands of dollars. He would have to design his own.
The simple machine looks like the Wright brothers' first flight - all the workings are on the outside
Four-and-a-half years later, he succeeded in creating a low-cost method for the production of sanitary towels. The process involves four simple steps. First, a machine similar to a kitchen grinder breaks down the hard cellulose into fluffy material, which is packed into rectangular cakes with another machine.
The cakes are then wrapped in non-woven cloth and disinfected in an ultraviolet treatment unit. The whole process can be learned in an hour.
Muruganantham's goal was to create user-friendly technology. The mission was not just to increase the use of sanitary pads, but also to create jobs for rural women - women like his mother. Following her husband's death in a road accident, Muruganantham's mother had had to sell everything she owned and get a job as a farm labourer, but earning $1 a day wasn't enough to support four children. That's why, at the age of 14, Muruganantham had left school to find work.
The machines are kept deliberately simple and skeletal so that they can be maintained by the women themselves. "It looks like the Wright brothers' first flight," he says. The first model was mostly made of wood, and when he showed it to the Indian Institute of Technology, IIT, in Madras, scientists were sceptical - how was this man going to compete against multinationals?
But Muruganantham had confidence. As the son of a handloom worker, he had seen his father survive with a simple wooden handloom, despite 446 fully mechanised mills in the city. That gave him the courage to take on the big companies with his small machine made of wood - besides, his aim was not really to compete. "We are creating a new market, we are paving the way for them," he says.
Unbeknown to him, the IIT entered his machine in a competition for a national innovation award. Out of 943 entries, it came first. He was given the award by the then President of India, Pratibha Patil - quite an achievement for a school dropout. Suddenly he was in the limelight.
"It was instant glory, media flashing in my face, everything" he says. "The irony is, after five-and-a-half years I get a call on my mobile - the voice huskily says: Remember me?"
It was his wife, Shanthi. She was not entirely surprised by her husband's success. "Every time he comes to know something new, he wants to know everything about it," she says. "And then he wants to do something about it that nobody else has done before."
However, this kind of ambition was not easy to live with. Not only was she shocked by his interest in such a matter, but it took up all of his time and money - at the time, they hardly had enough money to eat properly. And her troubles were compounded by gossip.
"The hardest thing was when the villagers started talking and treating us really badly," she says. "There were rumours that he was having affairs with other women, and that was why he was doing such things." She decided to go back home to live with her mother.
After Shanthi, eventually Muruganantham's own mother and the rest of the villagers - who had all condemned, criticised and ostracised him - came round too.
Muruganantham seemed set for fame and fortune, but he was not interested in profit. "Imagine, I got patent rights to the only machine in the world to make low-cost sanitary napkins - a hot-cake product," he says. "Anyone with an MBA would immediately accumulate the maximum money. But I did not want to. Why? Because from childhood I know no human being died because of poverty - everything happens because of ignorance."
He believes that big business is parasitic, like a mosquito, whereas he prefers the lighter touch, like that of a butterfly. "A butterfly can suck honey from the flower without damaging it," he says.
Muruganantham trains women to use his machines - he still installs many of them himself
There are still many taboos around menstruation in India. Women can't visit temples or public places, they're not allowed to cook or touch the water supply - essentially they are considered untouchable.
It took Muruganantham 18 months to build 250 machines, which he took out to the poorest and most underdeveloped states in Northern India - the so-called BIMARU or "sick" states of Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh. Here, women often have to walk for miles to fetch water, something they can't do when they are menstruating - so families suffer.
"My inner conscience said if I can crack it in Bihar, a very tough nut to crack, I can make it anywhere," says Muruganantham.
It was hard even to broach the subject in such a conservative society. "To speak to rural women, we need permission from the husband or father," he says. "We can only talk to them through a blanket."
There are also myths and fears surrounding the use of sanitary pads - that women who use them will go blind, for example, or will never get married. But slowly, village by village, there was cautious acceptance and over time the machines spread to 1,300 villages in 23 states.
In each case, it's the women who produce the sanitary pads who sell them directly to the customer. Shops are usually run by men, which can put women off. And when customers get them from women they know, they can also acquire important information on how to use them. Purchasers may not even need any money - many women barter for onions and potatoes.
While getting the message out to new areas of the country is still difficult, Muruganantham is sceptical about the effectiveness of TV advertising. "You always have a girl in white jeans, jumping over a wall," he says. "They never talk about hygiene."
Each producer chooses their own brand name - brands include Be Cool, Relax and Touch Free
Most of Muruganantham's clients are NGOs and women's self-help groups. A manual machine costs around 75,000 Indian rupees (£723) - a semi-automated machine costs more. Each machine converts 3,000 women to pad usage, and provides employment for 10. They can produce 200-250 pads a day which sell for an average of about 2.5 rupees (£0.025) each.
Women choose their own brand-name for their range of sanitary pads, so there is no over-arching brand - it is "by the women, for the women, and to the women".
Muruganantham also works with schools - 23% of girls drop out of education once they start menstruating. Now school girls make their own pads. "Why wait till they are women? Why not empower girls?"
Some Indian school girls are now making their own sanitary pads
The Indian government recently announced it would distribute subsidised sanitary products to poorer women. It was a blow for Muruganantham that it did not choose to work with him, but he now has his eyes on the wider world. "My aim was to create one million jobs for poor women - but why not 10 million jobs worldwide?" he asks. He is expanding to 106 countries across the globe, including Kenya, Nigeria, Mauritius, the Philippines, and Bangladesh.
"Our success is entirely down to word-of-mouth publicity," he says. "Because this is a problem all developing nations face."
Muruganantham now lives with his family in a modest apartment. He owns a jeep, "a rugged car that will take me to hillsides, jungles, forest", but has no desire to accumulate possessions. "I have accumulated no money but I accumulate a lot of happiness," he says. "If you get rich, you have an apartment with an extra bedroom - and then you die."
Muruganantham's wife Shanthi and their daughter Preeti on a day out
He prefers to spend his time talking to university and college students. He's an engaging and funny speaker, despite his idiosyncratic English. He says he is not working brain to brain but heart to heart.
"Luckily I'm not educated," he tells students. "If you act like an illiterate man, your learning will never stop... Being uneducated, you have no fear of the future."
His wife Shanthi agrees with him on this point. "If he had completed his education, he would be like any other guy, who works for someone else, who gets a daily wage," she says. "But because he did not complete school, he had the courage to come out to start a business of his own. Now he's employing other people."
Shanthi and Muruganantham are now a tight unit. "My wife, the business - it is not a separate thing, it is mixed up with our life," he says.
When a girl reaches puberty in their village, there is a ceremony - traditionally it meant that they were ready to marry. Shanthi always brings a sanitary pad as a gift and explains how to use it.
"Initially I used to be very shy when talking to people about it," she says. "But after all this time, people have started to open up. Now they come and talk to me, they ask questions and they also get sanitary napkins to try them. They have all changed a lot in the village."When a girl reaches puberty in their village, there is a ceremony - traditionally it meant that they were ready to marry. Shanthi always brings a sanitary pad as a gift and explains how to use it.
Muruganantham says she does a wonderful job.
He was once asked whether receiving the award from the Indian president was the happiest moment of his life. He said no - his proudest moment came after he installed a machine in a remote village in Uttarakhand, in the foothills of the Himalayas, where for many generations nobody had earned enough to allow children to go to school.
A year later, he received a call from a woman in the village to say that her daughter had started school. "Where Nehru failed," he says, "one machine succeeded."
Scindia Kanya Vidyalaya school principal Nishi Misra talking to women about hygiene in Madhya Pradesh
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The illuminating – and perhaps alarming – results of a huge survey answered by 1.4 million people around the world
Thursday, the United Nations is releasing some of the results of what is thought to be its largest global survey ever, part of a
worldwide initiative called MyWorld2015.The idea behind the survey, conducted by United Nations Millennium Campaign, the United Nations Development Programme and the Overseas Development Institute plus other partners, is relatively simple: People from all around the world were asked which six factors, out of 16 possibilities, would improve their lives and those of their families. The plan is to then share the results with the Secretary General and other global leaders as they prepare a development agenda in the run-up to 2015, which is when the United Nations's Millennium Development Goals will run out, and new development goals will be set.
What's more fascinating than the simple idea is the survey's scope. The United Nations has already spoken to 1.4 million people, and plans to keep talking to people until 2015. Plus, while most surveys focus on a small number of countries, this one is trying to capture a broad range of opinions from a large variety of countries -- the aim is to have 2,000 people per country, a sample size large enough to be representative.
The funnest part, however, is that the United Nations has released some of the data from the survey in a real-time graphical dataset, and it's really a good idea to spend 15 minutes playing around with it. You should check it out here.
So far, there's one clear result from the survey: People want better education.
(MyWorld/U.N.)
Pretty much every way you play around with the data, education takes the top spot -- a total of two-thirds of respondents have listed it as one of their top priorities, according to the United Nations. Demographically, only those over 61 years old found another top preference (understandably, health care came first here), and some specific countries had priorities specific to their own circumstances (For instance, Belorussians were, also understandably, more interested in an "honest and responsive government").
You can't really argue with education -- it's important, of course -- but the other end of the poll is a little more controversial: "Action on climate change" is a clear loser in the current results.
That's gotta smart for anyone urging serious, definite action on global warming. Corinne Woods, Director of the United Nations Millennium Campaign, conceded that the poor showing for climate change was a little surprising, but reasoned that could be due to the way the question was framed and that the United Nations still needed to analyze the data. Woods also stressed that polling was not done in a manner that allowed it to be representative (around half of the respondents were polled online or via SMS).
Still, it's got to sting for anyone hoping that climate change could be fought with individual actions. The results of this huge survey seem to show that most individuals are not interested.
Pretty much every way you play around with the data, education takes the top spot -- a total of two-thirds of respondents have listed it as one of their top priorities, according to the United Nations. Demographically, only those over 61 years old found another top preference (understandably, health care came first here), and some specific countries had priorities specific to their own circumstances (For instance, Belorussians were, also understandably, more interested in an "honest and responsive government").
You can't really argue with education -- it's important, of course -- but the other end of the poll is a little more controversial: "Action on climate change" is a clear loser in the current results.
That's gotta smart for anyone urging serious, definite action on global warming. Corinne Woods, Director of the United Nations Millennium Campaign, conceded that the poor showing for climate change was a little surprising, but reasoned that could be due to the way the question was framed and that the United Nations still needed to analyze the data. Woods also stressed that polling was not done in a manner that allowed it to be representative (around half of the respondents were polled online or via SMS).
Still, it's got to sting for anyone hoping that climate change could be fought with individual actions. The results of this huge survey seem to show that most individuals are not interested.
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A constitution not worth its ink
Rana Allam / February 19, 2014 /
I have faced the same questions from a segment of Egyptians who support military rule and a “firmer fist facing terrorism”. Those Egyptians who either deny the existence of oppression, or accept it as a means to combat what they perceive as “terrorism” or “chaos”, seem to not comprehend the magnitude of the violations to the constitution they so strongly backed.Since the new constitution passed, I have been flooded with emails and meetings from foreign journalists, lawyers, rights advocates and what have you, asking the same question: Isn’t the newly passed constitution better in preserving human rights and freedoms, compared to the previous one(s)? And shouldn’t this be enough for Egyptians?
The “chaos” that is overwhelming is a direct result of the absence of the rule of law in Egypt. The selective justice, the oppression, and the impunity of those responsible for upholding the law will be the reason for even more instability.
Violence breeds violence, and injustice was the main flame that sparked the 25 January 2011 revolution. A good first step to combating violence and injustice would be to implement the widely approved constitutional articles. After all the publicity for a Yes vote under the pretext that this constitution would be the cornerstone of a democratic, free and progressive country, I suppose its implementation should have begun two months ago, but no one seems to mind that their wait in those long voting queues was indeed to no avail.
I thought I should explain this in a bit of detail just to avoid the confusion when it comes to the real value of “laws” and “constitution articles” on the ground in Egypt.
Here is a list of some rights that Egyptians have… but really don’t enjoy:
- Freedom of religion:
Article 64:
“Freedom of belief is absolute. The freedom of practicing religious rituals and establishing places of worship for the followers of revealed religions is a right organised by law.”
Of course, the article itself is contradictory as it stands, for how can one guarantee “freedom” when it is limited to the three Abrahamic religions, ignoring the 1,100 million followers of Hinduism or the 488 million Buddhists, to name just two. It also ignores that not following a religion should also be counted as a freedom… one cannot be an atheist in Egypt. One of the strangest things we have here is having our religion documented in our national ID cards (bizarre!) and one cannot get married (for example) without being a follower of one of the three Abrahamic religions. There is no civil marriage in Egypt.
On top of this, even within the three Abrahamic “revealed” religions, Egypt discriminates against Shi’as. Talk of how devious the Shi’as are is all over the TV and newspapers, how Egypt needs to “stop the expansion of the Shi’a beliefs”. In a striking move, Egypt refused Shi’a pilgrims from entering the country several times, even after passing the “progressive” constitution.
- Freedom of the press
Article 71: Freedom of publication
“It is prohibited to censor, confiscate, suspend or shut down Egyptian newspapers and media outlets in any way. Exception may be made for limited censorship in time of war or general mobilisation. No custodial sanction shall be imposed for crimes committed by way of publication or the public nature thereof. Punishments for crimes connected with incitement to violence or discrimination amongst citizens, or impugning the honour of individuals are specified by law.”
“It is prohibited to censor, confiscate, suspend or shut down Egyptian newspapers and media outlets in any way. Exception may be made for limited censorship in time of war or general mobilisation. No custodial sanction shall be imposed for crimes committed by way of publication or the public nature thereof. Punishments for crimes connected with incitement to violence or discrimination amongst citizens, or impugning the honour of individuals are specified by law.”
Article 72: Independence of press institutions
“The state shall ensure the independence of all press institutions and owned media outlets, in a way that ensures their neutrality and expressing all opinions, political and intellectual trends and social interests; and guarantees equality and equal opportunity in addressing public opinion.”
“The state shall ensure the independence of all press institutions and owned media outlets, in a way that ensures their neutrality and expressing all opinions, political and intellectual trends and social interests; and guarantees equality and equal opportunity in addressing public opinion.”
Now, volumes have been written on this particular topic. Freedom of the press is a myth in Egypt, especially with Arabic publications which are under scrutiny because they reach tens of millions of Egyptians and form effective public opinion. A read through Sara Abou Bakr’s piece: Journalism in Egypt, a risky business, would shed light on the status of journalism. But then, I am sure everyone knows exactly what is going on, from the targeting, detention and killing of journalists, and the closure of publications and TV channels – even comedic satire shows get banned.
Suffice to say that the annual report, released by media watchdog Reporters Without Borders, ranked Egypt as 159th out of 180 listed countries in the 2014 World Press Freedom Index. Also, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) ranked the country as the third deadliest country for journalists in 2013. Let it be known that nothing has changed, except maybe for the worse, since the constitution passed.
- Freedom of thought/speech
Article 65: Freedom of thought and opinion is guaranteed.
“All individuals have the right to express their opinion through speech, writing, imagery, or any other means of expression and publication”.
“All individuals have the right to express their opinion through speech, writing, imagery, or any other means of expression and publication”.
Detentions of everyone caught with a Morsi poster, a Rabaa sign (whether as a car sticker or holding up the four fingers), children carrying school equipment with the “devilish” sign on it, are all common news.
Indeed, Brotherhood supporters are not the only victims of this. Protesters who chant against military rule, or people who are caught in possession of banners with “No to Military Trials for Civilians” written on them, or even leaflets opposing the current oppressive regime, are all taken for questioning, sometimes to be detained indefinitely.
Naturally, worth mentioning here are the dozens of activists detained and some sentenced to prison for merely speaking out or “distributing flyers”.
Indeed, Brotherhood supporters are not the only victims of this. Protesters who chant against military rule, or people who are caught in possession of banners with “No to Military Trials for Civilians” written on them, or even leaflets opposing the current oppressive regime, are all taken for questioning, sometimes to be detained indefinitely.
Naturally, worth mentioning here are the dozens of activists detained and some sentenced to prison for merely speaking out or “distributing flyers”.
- Right to respectful detention
Article 58: Inviolability of homes
“Homes are inviolable… Upon entering or searching homes, those inside shall be notified and informed of the warrant issued in this regard.”
“Homes are inviolable… Upon entering or searching homes, those inside shall be notified and informed of the warrant issued in this regard.”
“Dawn Visitors” is a term known to everyone who works in politics in Egypt; it refers to state security officers who come to people’s houses at dawn to arrest them. The scenario is usually the same; they barge into the house, turn it upside down in search of “evidence” (which can mean a piece of paper, a leaflet, a banner, etc.), drag the man from his bed, assault the woman in the house, and leave with their suspect. No one dares ask for a search or an arrest warrant, since they would probably face even worse treatment.
Article 55: Due Process
“All those who are apprehended, detained or have their freedom restricted shall be treated in a way that preserves their dignity. They may not be tortured, terrorised, or coerced. They may not be physically or mentally harmed, or arrested and confined in designated locations that are appropriate according to humanitarian and health standards. The state shall provide means of access for those with disabilities. Any violation of the above is a crime and the perpetrator shall be punished under the law.”
“All those who are apprehended, detained or have their freedom restricted shall be treated in a way that preserves their dignity. They may not be tortured, terrorised, or coerced. They may not be physically or mentally harmed, or arrested and confined in designated locations that are appropriate according to humanitarian and health standards. The state shall provide means of access for those with disabilities. Any violation of the above is a crime and the perpetrator shall be punished under the law.”
Reports of torture in detention facilities and prisons in Egypt have flooded the news pages and social networks. Every human rights organisation, national and int
In Tuesday’s issue of Daily News Egypt, coverage of torture victims speaking out is heart-wrenching.
Oh, and the MOI, as usual, denies.
Oh, and the MOI, as usual, denies.
When the state handcuffs a young woman who is just out of a c-section surgery “for fear that she might accuse the officer of harassing her, or of jumping from the window” as per the MOI, then every law in this country is violated. Rights of motherhood, children and right to respectful detention, are completely violated.
As a common practice, detainees are denied medical treatment, even from chronic health conditions. Several die because of this.
When a man dies of electrocution in a detention cell, then something is seriously wrong with this country.
When a man dies of electrocution in a detention cell, then something is seriously wrong with this country.
- Children’s rights
Article 80: The rights of the child
“…The state shall care for children and protect them from all forms of violence, abuse, mistreatment and commercial and sexual exploitation.
Every child is entitled to early education in a childhood center until the age of six. It is prohibited to employ children before they reach the age of having completed their primary education, and it is prohibited to employ them in jobs that expose them to risk.
The state shall establish a judicial system for child victims and witnesses. No child may be held criminally responsible or detailed except in accordance with the law and the time frame specified therein. Legal aid shall be provided to children, and they shall be detained in appropriate locations separate from adult detention centers.
The state shall work to achieve children’s best interest in all measures taken with regards to them.”
“…The state shall care for children and protect them from all forms of violence, abuse, mistreatment and commercial and sexual exploitation.
Every child is entitled to early education in a childhood center until the age of six. It is prohibited to employ children before they reach the age of having completed their primary education, and it is prohibited to employ them in jobs that expose them to risk.
The state shall establish a judicial system for child victims and witnesses. No child may be held criminally responsible or detailed except in accordance with the law and the time frame specified therein. Legal aid shall be provided to children, and they shall be detained in appropriate locations separate from adult detention centers.
The state shall work to achieve children’s best interest in all measures taken with regards to them.”
A very long article in the constitution is written on children’s rights; I have only quoted some of it. Describing the suffering of children in Egypt can be an endless task. First are street children who are not provided with shelter, health care, education, or any means of survival by the state, living in miserable conditions. The latest estimate of such children, which was in 2011, was three million, and this is the government’s figure. National and international NGOs are not able to confirm the number of street children, so nobody knows exactly how many street children there are.
On top of this, the state actually detains children. As per Amnesty International, over 300 children have been thrown into prison in the past seven months.
Their treatment, says Amnesty, reveals a “consistent picture of physical and emotional abuse, as well as myriad breaches in the rights of the detainees”. These are the children that are supposed to be protected by the state as per the constitution. The reasons for their detentions are just as ludicrous as everything in Egypt, and include one boy arrested for possession of a ruler that has a Rabaa sign, or another who was present in a protest! Of course, the state is doing its best to “investigate the matter” and the National Council for Human Rights had intended to form (yet another) committee. What’s happened since then? Nothing, as usual!
Their treatment, says Amnesty, reveals a “consistent picture of physical and emotional abuse, as well as myriad breaches in the rights of the detainees”. These are the children that are supposed to be protected by the state as per the constitution. The reasons for their detentions are just as ludicrous as everything in Egypt, and include one boy arrested for possession of a ruler that has a Rabaa sign, or another who was present in a protest! Of course, the state is doing its best to “investigate the matter” and the National Council for Human Rights had intended to form (yet another) committee. What’s happened since then? Nothing, as usual!
But there are other more political problems with children. They are being used by every political power in this country, be they at Muslim Brotherhood protests or at demonstrations hailing Al Sisi. The MB risks, and seemingly does not care, that those kids will probably be arrested – or worse – injured in the constant clashes that with security forces. The Al Sisi supporters subject kids to humiliation. An AFP photo featured a supporter of Al-Sisi standing with her children as they hold army boots over their heads in a sign of support for military rule, while dressed in Egyptian flags. In another incident, during the referendum on that same constitution, children’s rights groups monitored dozens of violations over the two days of voting. The incidents, as per the Egyptian Centre for Children’s Rights, varied between “using children to chant and to carry signs” and exploitation by groups campaigning for a Yes vote for the constitutional referendum. ECCR also witnessed a group of school children distributing money to voters urging them to vote No.
- Private life
Article 57: Private life
“Private life is inviolable, safeguarded and may not be infringed upon.
Telegraph, postal, and electronic correspondence, telephone calls, and other forms of communication are inviolable, their confidentiality is guaranteed and they may only be confiscated, examined or monitored by causal judicial order, for a limited period of time, and in cases specified by the law.”
“Private life is inviolable, safeguarded and may not be infringed upon.
Telegraph, postal, and electronic correspondence, telephone calls, and other forms of communication are inviolable, their confidentiality is guaranteed and they may only be confiscated, examined or monitored by causal judicial order, for a limited period of time, and in cases specified by the law.”
Where most Egyptians are concerned, the basic meaning of privacy is lost. This is probably why this particular article in the constitution should be enforced. Egyptian media and TV have no idea what this means, and being pro-state as far as that can reach, they are left to exercise the maximum amount of violation of this right to privacy.
On TV, private phone calls of activists and writers are aired. The minutes of arresting people, be they Muslim Brotherhood figures, or activists or even journalists, are also aired on TV. No one asked where they got the recordings, no one investigated how this was aired, and no one was reprimanded, neither by the Public Prosecution, nor by the Press Syndicate or Ministry of Information. It’s all just fine; all in a day’s work!
I will not speak of the right to strike or protest; it’s enough to know that there is a completely contradictory Protest Law in effect. Nor will I speak of the rights to housing, education, health care, and gender equality. These are all far-fetched dreams in times like these.
After all the reports and the news we read every day, when one realises that there is indeed an article in the constitution solely about “Human Dignity”, it is difficult to resist mocking the whole document and the regime behind it!
I have only gone through five topics, however one can write a full book citing almost every article in that constitution and how it contradicts the reality on the ground.
What good is the constitution if none of its articles is enforced? That is the question we need to ask ourselves and our leaders. As far as I am concerned, it is not worth the ink it is written with!
