Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has caught both allies and opponents off guard with a historic and unprecedented announcement in the post-revolution history of the Egyptian state. Sisi will not run for president after completing his term in 2030. He also pledged that Egypt’s constitution, which has undergone several amendments since President Hosni Mubarak stepped down, will never be touched again.
اضافة اعلان
Since the July 1952 Revolution, seven presidents have ruled Egypt, two of them for short transitional periods: Mohamed Naguib and Adly Mansour. The other five served longer terms. None left power voluntarily. President Gamal Abdel Nasser died in office, Anwar Sadat was assassinated, and Hosni Mubarak stepped down under pressure from the streets. Mohamed Morsi died while in detention following a popular uprising led by the military.
President Sisi came to power through elections 12 years ago, under difficult circumstances. He emerged from the military establishment, which had previously produced three of the country’s longest-serving presidents.
Until recently, the prevailing assumption was that Sisi would follow in the footsteps of his predecessors and remain president indefinitely, as has been the case in Arab republics over the past century. Amending the constitution is not difficult. Many Arab republics have rewritten their constitutions to accommodate the wishes of their leaders.
Although exceptions have occurred in a few rare Arab cases, such as Abdelrahman Swar al-Dahab in Sudan, the significance and impact of such a move are particularly important when it comes from Egypt, the Arab country that has led waves of change across the region and whose political model has shaped the experiences of other Arab countries and peoples.
Sisi was not under political or popular pressure to announce so early that he would not seek another term. The next presidential election is scheduled for 2030, and he could have left the door open for another two or three years. But the man and I believe he is the first Egyptian leader to grasp the lessons of the painful transformations Egypt has experienced over many decades made this decision at this particular time to prevent political interpretations or speculation from steering events toward a path that would force Egypt into permanent rule or hereditary succession, as happened under Mubarak and other presidents of Arab republics.
Sisi has decided to build his political legacy in a way entirely different from that of his predecessors: not merely as the man who took control of Egypt before it plunged into the abyss, but as the president who fulfilled his mission and then departed, confident that the Egyptian state and its institutions are capable of continuing forward and choosing a new president likely to come from the same military establishment from which Sisi emerged.
This announcement will resonate across the Arab world when it takes effect in a few years. It will become difficult for an Arab republic to keep its president in power indefinitely after the Egyptian example.
Sisi has learned a bitter lesson and does not want his country to reproduce a model that nearly plunged it into widespread chaos. Other Arab republics have paid a heavy price before managing to break free from this cycle. It remains to be seen whether they will follow Sisi’s path or once again succumb to the temptation of indefinite rule, followed by hereditary succession.
