The UN’s former nuclear chief has yet to return home to his native Egypt after almost a quarter century monitoring the world’s atomic programs, but the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize winner has already created the biggest political stir in his homeland in years by hinting at a new career in politics.
Mohamed ElBaradei may one day regret plunging into Egypt’s politics — where challenges to the regime have been few and swiftly dealt with — but his move has injected fresh hope into the country’s stagnant political atmosphere.
Egypt has been ruled for nearly 30 years by President Hosni Mubarak, now 81, who appears to be trying to set up a political dynasty by grooming his son to succeed him.
Respected throughout the world and untouched by the corruption tainting much of the regime in Egypt, ElBaradei could well be the most credible opposition leader to emerge in the country in living memory.
However, the chances of ElBaradei of even being allowed to run in the 2011 presidential race are slim, thanks to a series of constitutional amendments pushed through by the government in 2005 and 2007 that practically limit the candidacies to senior members of the ruling party or a few token, officially sanctioned, opposition parties.
Even if he did run, he would be faced by a ruling party candidate backed by the government’s vast resources and enjoying the support of the security agencies, the most powerful players in Egyptian elections.
“But the frustration within Egypt is such that such a figure could inspire a real sense of opposition even if such sentiments are primarily a rejection of the status quo,” said Egyptian-American analyst Michael Hanna of the Century Foundation in New York. “He is a very compelling figure.”
ElBaradei is not expected to return home from Vienna for another month, but in an open letter responding to a campaign by young Egyptians urging him to run for president, he said he would only run if there were guarantees that elections would be free, fully supervised by the judiciary and monitored by the international community.
He also wants the Constitution amended to remove restrictions on who is eligible to run.
“What I want is for Egypt to become a democratic nation ... my words are not driven by a personal desire or motive but by a firm conviction that the people of Egypt deserve 10 times better than what they have,” he told the independent al-Shorouk daily in an interview last month.
Egypt’s authoritarian ruler of 28 years, Mubarak has not named a successor and never had a vice president since he took office in 1981.
Some commentators say the soft-spoken ElBaradei could be of more use to Egypt if he did not seek the presidency and focused instead on creating a popular movement to press for reform.
“Entering the presidential arena is the wrong start,” Abdel-Azeem Hamad, editor of al-Shorouk, warned ElBaradei in a recent article, suggesting instead a run for parliament in next year’s general election.
Others, however, say he could be the country’s savior, delivering its 80 million people from what is widely seen as policies biased in favor of the rich and against the poor and forcing Mubarak, or his successor, into introducing genuine reforms.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘BODIES EVERYWHERE’: The incident occurred at a Filipino festival celebrating an anti-colonial leader, with the driver described as a ‘lone suspect’ known to police Canadian police arrested a man on Saturday after a car plowed into a street party in the western Canadian city of Vancouver, killing a number of people. Authorities said the incident happened shortly after 8pm in Vancouver’s Sunset on Fraser neighborhood as members of the Filipino community gathered to celebrate Lapu Lapu Day. The festival, which commemorates a Filipino anti-colonial leader from the 16th century, falls this year on the weekend before Canada’s election. A 30-year-old local man was arrested at the scene, Vancouver police wrote on X. The driver was a “lone suspect” known to police, a police spokesperson told journalists at the
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has unveiled a new naval destroyer, claiming it as a significant advancement toward his goal of expanding the operational range and preemptive strike capabilities of his nuclear-armed military, state media said yesterday. North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim attended the launching ceremony for the 5,000-tonne warship on Friday at the western port of Nampo. Kim framed the arms buildup as a response to perceived threats from the US and its allies in Asia, who have been expanding joint military exercises amid rising tensions over the North’s nuclear program. He added that the acquisition
RSS