Egypt’s
armed forces yesterday overthrew the elected Islamist President Mohamed
Morsi and announced a political transition with the support of a wide
range of political, religious and youth leaders.
After a day of drama in which tanks and troops deployed near the
presidential palace as a military deadline for Morsi to yield to mass
protests passed, the head of the country’s armed forces announced on
television that the president had “failed to meet the demands of the
Egyptian people”.
Flanked by political and religious leaders and top generals, General
Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced the suspension of the Islamisttinged
constitution and a roadmap for a return to democratic rule under a
revised rulebook.
He said that the chief justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court,
Adli Mansour, would be given the task of “running the country’s affairs
during the transitional period” assisted by an interim council and a
technocratic government until new presidential and parliamentary
elections are held.
“Those in the meeting have agreed on a roadmap for the future that
includes initial steps to achieve the building of a strong Egyptian
society that is cohesive and does not exclude anyone and ends the state
of tension and division,” Sisi said in a solemn address broadcast live
on state television.
He insisted that the armed forces could not stay silent and blind to the call of the Egyptian masses.
After he spoke, hundreds of thousands of anti-Morsi protesters in
central Cairo’s Tahrir Square erupted into wild cheering, setting off
fireworks and waving flags. Cars drove around the capital honking their
horns in celebration.
But a statement published in Morsi’s name on his official Facebook
page after Sisi’s speech said the measures announced amounted to “a full
military coup” and were “totally rejected”.
The Arab world’s most populous nation has been in turmoil since the
fall of autocrat Hosni Mubarak as Arab Spring uprisings took hold in
early 2011, arousing concern among allies in the West and in Israel,
with which Egypt has a 1979 peace treaty.
The Muslim Brotherhood president, in office for just a year, was at a
Republican Guard barracks surrounded by barbed wire, barriers and
troops, but it was not clear whether he was under arrest. The state
newspaper Al- Ahram said the military had told Morsi at 7 p.m. (1700
GMT) that he was no longer head of state.
Military chiefs, vowing to restore order in a country racked by
protests over Mursi’s Islamist policies, earlier issued a call to battle
in a statement headlined “The Final Hours”. They said they were willing
to shed blood against “terrorists and fools”.
Armored vehicles took up position outside the state broadcasting
headquarters on the Nile River bank, where soldiers patrolled the
corridors and non-essential staff were sent home.
In another show of force, several hundred soldiers with armored
vehicles staged a parade near the presidential palace, and security
sources said Morsi and the entire senior leadership of his Muslim
Brotherhood were banned from leaving the country.
Security sources told Reuters the authorities had sent a list of at
least 40 leading members of the Brotherhood to airport police after a
travel ban was imposed on them.
In a last-ditch statement a few minutes before the deadline, Morsi’s
office said a coalition government could be part of a solution to
overcome the political crisis. But opposition parties refused to
negotiate with him and met instead with the commander of the armed
forces.
The Brotherhood’s Egypt25 television station had broadcast live
coverage of a rally of tens of thousands of Morsi supporters, even as
the army moved tanks into position to prevent them from marching on the
presidential palace or the Republican Guard barracks.
U.S. oil prices rose to a 14-month high above $100 a barrel partly on
fears that unrest in Egypt could destabilize the Middle East and lead
to supply disruption.
The massive anti-Morsi protests showed that the Brotherhood had not
only alienated liberals and secularists by seeking to entrench Islamic
rule, notably in a new constitution, but had also angered millions of
Egyptians with economic mismanagement.
Tourism and investment have dried up, inflation is rampant and fuel
supplies are running short, with power cuts lengthening in the summer
heat and motorists spending hours fuelling cars.
Earlier, Morsi’s spokesman said it was better that he die in defense of democracy than be blamed by history.
“It is better for a president, who would otherwise be returning Egypt
to the days of dictatorship, from which God and the will of the people
has saved us, to die standing like a tree,” spokesman Ayman Ali said,
“Rather than be condemned by history and future generations for throwing
away the hopes of Egyptians for establishing a democratic life.”
Liberal opponents said a rambling late-night television address by Morsi showed he had “lost his mind”.
The official spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood said supporters were willing to become martyrs to defend Morsi.
“There is only one thing we can do: we will stand in between the
tanks and the president,” Gehad El-Haddad told Reuters at the movement’s
protest encampment in a Cairo suburb that houses many military
installations and is near the presidential palace.
The country’s two main religious leaders, the head of the Al-Azhar
Islamic institute and the Coptic Pope, both expressed their support for
the army’s roadmap in speeches after Sisi, as did the main liberal
opposition leader, Nobel peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei.
