As evening falls on Cairo Friday, Tahrir Square is filled to the bursting point with cheering protesters, some of whom have been there for days in makeshift communities. Vice President and Mubarak supporter Omar Suleiman announced on state-run television that Mubarak was relinquishing power and that the military would assume control of the country effective immediately. After three decades of ruling Egypt, Mubarak has left Cairo. Speculation runs rampant that he has finally found a country that will allow him to live in exile without fear of extradition or prosecution.
An 18-day protest, sparked and fueled by social media outlets such as Facebook, toppled the Mubarak regime with minimal bloodshed; a coup for a continent used to bloody wars. Mubarak's predecessor, Anwar Sadat, was assassinated in 1981 by Islamic fundamentalists with the support of the military under a fatwa declared by Omar Abdel-Rahman, an Islamic cleric later indicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Although revolution always leads to change, it does not always lead to positive change or the political system desired by the revolutionaries. The 1979 Iranian revolution that saw the exile of the Shah and the installation of the Islamic fundamentalist Ayatollah Khomeini was immensely popular at the time but ultimately traded a monarchist dictatorship for a religious one. This led to further suppression of free speech, the free press and women's rights.
In Africa, the protracted and bloody liberation of Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia) resulted in a civil war that still tears the country apart politically and economically today. Infant mortality rates in the country are some of the highest in the world and the life expectancy of Zimbabwean men is 44 and, for women, 43.
Egypt, in contrast to many northern African countries, has experienced a relatively stable political and economic situation post-Sadat. The Mubarak regime had managed to walk a delicate line between Western democratic sensibilities and Muslim respect. Over the past three decades, Mubarak's accumulation of increasing power and the suppression of political opposition has created an unrest in the country, especially in the younger population. As economic conditions and employment declined and food shortages increased, the popular revolution that led to the fall of the Mubarak government grew, fueled by foreign support and a lack of military commitment to Mubarak's regime.
As of today, the military rules Egypt in the short term. As to what happens going forward, it is anyone's guess. Organized political opposition has been suppressed for so long that no one appears capable of stepping into ruling shoes at present. Based on history in war-torn Africa, the change that may come to Egypt may not be the change the protesters are hoping for.
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