April 2011 - Centre for Civil Society - University of KwaZulu-Natal

have continued to unite under the banner of spontaneous popular
revolution. They unite against the existing corrupt, tyrannical system,
rotten from the head to the feet of the modern Pharaoh. His throne is
sticky with the blood of the people, as his ruling party releases thugs to
kill the young, and parliament’s deputies forge fake laws, while trading in
land and women, drugs and bribes. His so-called educated elite long ago
sold its pens and conscience, misleading public opinion, all for the
interests of positions in government, large or small.
But this revolution has launched young women, men, and even children
from their homes, driving them forward, protecting each other. So the old
order is falling, and with it falls what the police call “Security,” and with
it falls the elite controlling information and culture, and with it falls the
self-appointed “Committee of the Wise Men” who are linked to wealth and
power. And party leaders, even those in so-called opposition who
nevertheless opportunistically supported the regime covertly and overtly
for more than half a century, all are falling.
These were the forces that wreaked chaos under the name of security,
dictatorship under the name of democracy, poverty and unemployment
under the name of development and prosperity, prostitution and
harassment and misogyny under the name of freedom of choice or
tradition, and subordination and servile colonialism under the name of
partnership and friendship or the peace process. They imprisoned women
like myself, owners of voices and pens, trying to silence us inside their
cells, or isolate us and distort our reputation, or expel us to exile outside
and inside the homeland.
But this time is different. This time there poured forth millions of men and
women, to the streets of all the provinces, all the villages and cities, from
Aswan to Alexandria, Suez, Port Said, every inch of the homeland. In the
capital, Cairo, shines the field of liberation, Tahrir (which means
Liberation) Square—our land, our camp. It is a tent city over asphalt, and
inside the tents one bloc solid of human beings.
We do not leave our place even when attacked last Wednesday 2 February
by police disguised in civilian clothes, who broke into our field—gangs
hired by the regime, taking bribes. Gunmen with all kinds of weapons
riding horses and camels came thundering at us. I was sitting in the square
talking with young people, and I saw with my own eyes the barbarism,
riders in the field, fire everywhere, dust and smoke covering the ground. I
saw fireballs flying in the air, and young women and men drop down and
bleed.
Yet the Egyptian people’s dovish calls for freedom, dignity, and justice
persisted, and the Defense Committee of Revolutionary Youth was able to
triumph over the thugs, and even arrest some of the bribe-takers with all
their identity cards—including state security officers, trustees of police.
Some of them have no work, some of them admitted taking 200 pounds
and being promised 5000 pounds if they dispersed the people in the field
and showered Molotov cocktails down on us.
Still, it goes on. Young people set up the tents for rest a few hours at
night, so the mothers of infants and their children would no longer be on
the ground in the cold and the rain. Hundreds of young girls walk free,
chanting—and not one has been sexually harassed or molested. The chants
are for freedom, dignity, and equality—and many are led by women, with
men following. Coptic Christians are side by side with Muslims. Even some
of the youth of the Muslim Brotherhood told me, “We disagree with some
your writings but love you because you did not change opportunistically,