Cairo’s streets exploded in joy on Friday when President Hosni Mubarak stepped down after three-decades of autocratic rule and handed power to a junta of senior military commanders.
A grim-faced and ashen Vice President Omar Suleiman announced the handover on state television after an extraordinary national outpouring of rage brought more than a million furious demonstrators onto the streets.
“Taking into consideration the difficult circumstances the country is going through, President Mohammed Hosni Mubarak has decided to leave the post of president of the republic and has tasked the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to manage the state’s affairs,” Suleiman said.
Earlier, the 82-year-old strongman had flown out of Cairo to his holiday retreat at Sharm el-Sheikh on the Red Sea, his ruling party said.
As news spread cries of “Allahu Akbar” — God is greatest! — and howls of victory rang out in the streets of the capital and firecrackers exploded.
In Tahrir Square several protesters fainted with the emotion of the moment following two weeks of protest.
The plaza has become a focal point of the revolt since it was occupied by protesters in late January, and earlier in the day had been thronged by hundreds of thousands of Egyptians, who prayed and chanted abuse at Mubarak.
“People here don’t care if he’s in the palace or not. We want him to quit the presidency,” said 40-year-old Mohammed Hamdan, who works for an oil firm, as he joined the protest outside Mubarak’s palace in the Cairo suburbs.
“He has to leave the country, our demands are clear, we want the entire NDP to be dissolved and to get out because they have destroyed the country,” said Magdi Sabri, a smartly dressed middle-aged man outside state television.
In a show of solidarity in at least lower levels of the army, three Egyptian officers shed their weapons and uniforms and joined the protesters.
An impassioned preacher addressed the military in his sermon, exhorting them to “act in a way that will be acceptable to God on judgement day,” shortly before fainting and being carried away through the crowd.
On Thursday night, hundreds of thousands had crowded into Tahrir Square to hear a speech that was widely expected to be Mubarak’s last as president.
Instead, he delegated some of his powers to his ally and Egypt’s former intelligence supremo, Omar Suleiman, while vowing he would stay in office until September and one day die in Egypt, ruling out a flight into exile.
Mubarak had also been on a collision course with the international community, and in particular Egypt’s key ally and donor, Washington.
In his speech on Thursday, he took a swipe at the United States and other countries that want a faster transition to democracy in the Arab world’s most populous nation, vowing: “I have never bent to foreign diktats.”
US President Barack Obama reacted with a flash of anger of his own, saying Mubarak had failed to map out “meaningful or sufficient” change, or to speak clearly enough to Egypt and the world.
Link
Ali Rampurwala
February 11, 2011
Now we can surely expect oil prices to normalize and stock markets atleast in the Middle East to rise as markets open post the weekend.
Ali Rampurwala
February 12, 2011
Joy in Arab world over Egypt as people ask who is next? – Economic Times
The euphoria that marked the downfall of despot Hosni Mubarak in Egypt reverberated to the people across the Arab and Muslim world, but stunned most of the regimes in the Middle East and beyond where autocratic rulers apparently calculated their own chances of survival.
People in Palestine, Jordan, Turkey, Yemen, Bahrain, Algeria, Lebanon, Syria and Iran greeted with fanfare the victory of people in Egypt by fireworks, honking horns, embracing and greeting each other with joy, but there was a stunned silence in the corridors of powers in most of the countries.
Most of the key Arab states including Saudi Arabia, Libya, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain which are monarchies and sheikhdoms are yet to respond to events in Egypt — the most populated Arab country.
It has been just eight weeks since a young Tunisian vegetable seller Mohammad Bouazizi set himself on fire in the provincial town of Sidi, triggering a revolution which has toppled two powerful Arab regimes in Tunisia and Egypt.
Inspired by events in Tunsia and Egypt, groups are already rallying in Yemen, Algeria, Jordan and Bahrain. The people have been intensely following the unfolding of peoples’ power in Egypt through satellite channels, social networking websites and papers.
Turkey, one of the largest Muslim democratic country, was the first to greet the events in Egypt with Prime Minister Rcecep Tayyip Erdogan congratulating the Egyptian people and urging the military to swiftly transfer power to the elected government.
In Doha, the ruling family of Qatar described the transition of power to military as positive and important and hoped that Egypt would regain the leading role in Arab and Muslim world.
The gas rich kingdom has earned the ire of its neighboring states including Egypt over the coverage of events by Al-Jazeera news channel which is part owned by the ruling family.
Saluting the Egyptian people, the Iranian government, which has broken off diplomatic ties with Cairo , described the Egyptian uprising as a great victory.
Iran’s Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had earlier called for establishment of an Islamic regime in Egypt. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said a new Middle East was being carved out that would be free of “US and Israel.”
Celebrations also erupted in Lebanon and Gaza. In Beirut and Gaza, people rushed into the streets handing out candy, setting of fireworks and shooting in the air.
Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which has been at the receiving end of Mubarak, congratulated the Egyptians on the historic victory. The group said it was holding a massive popular celebration to mark the victory of the Egyptian people.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/joy-in-arab-world-over-egypt-as-people-ask-who-is-next/articleshow/7481879.cms