A transitional government must be in place to establish a comprehensive reform

President Mubarak, under pressure, has agreed to amend one article of the constitution, but would this be sufficient to produce the comprehensive reforms that we have been struggling for, for the past twenty five years?
The apparent goal of this change is to replace the current system of “referendum” in selecting the president to what “looks like” a Democratic system to elect the president, if History tells us anything, the so-called “tailors of laws” will work extremely hard to make sure that this amendment to the law is no more than a cosmetic one, and to guarantee the continuation of the status quo for the current president to be re-elected or for his Son to inherit the presidency. But, We are not as naïve as they think we are, Mr. Mubarak was in fact forced to make that cosmetic change, after many years of absolute refusal to do so, the last time was days ago prior to his announcement, it is very obvious that their goal is to keep dictatorship and corruption just as they are.

Briefly stated, what is needed is not to amend one or two articles of the Egyptian constitution, but to change the entire constitution to become a true democratic one that befits Egypt and the people of Egypt. Furthermore, the constitutional reform by itself will not be enough either, a comprehensive reform to the legislature process must be enacted to provide a solid ground for the political reform. And a political reform without a religious reform that lend it a legitimate and solid support so we may avoid jumping in a darkness that will be followed by a cataclysm that is reminiscent to the European cries when they shouted ”hang the last tyrannical with the intestine of the last Clergy”

What we need for our beloved Egypt is a peaceful reform that is inevitable, it can not be delayed or stalled, otherwise, there may be an explosion. The stubbornness and inflexibility of one individual may result in a very grave result for Egypt especially following the fundamental changes that the entire world has seen since 9/11/2001.

Following the elections of the People’s Assembly, in the late 1995, we were shocked at the strangling of our tiny marginal democracy by the Egyptian Government at a time when the “train” of Freedom and Democracy was stopping at many international stations of other nations that are far less developed than Egypt. As a reaction to that shock, I have, in agreement with Dr.Saad-Eldin Ibrahim, decided to begin a weekly open session in Ibn-Khaldoun Center, under the name “Ibn-Khaldoun forum” which started on Tuesday, the second of January 1996. We gave the name “So we do not jump in the darkness- A Plan for development of Egypt in the twenty first century” to those sessions, and as of today, these sessions continued to take place.

We began the weekly sessions for the first few months by inviting some well known candidates to the people’s assembly, who lost their bids to be elected as a result of government schemes and interferences, something the government has historically been able to do by using elections, which is the symbol of Democracy, to their advantage to solidify dictatorship.

The meetings that were attended by Egyptian political think tanks and jurists concluded that reforms must be done in the areas of Election laws, The constitution, and Criminal laws, in addition it was also concluded that reforms has to be done also to the legislation process.

The Ibn Khaldoun Forum meetings continued for finding a way for reforms, and as a result, the center and the gallery were the subject of orchestrated attacks by the media and the government, that continued till now.


About that time I wrote this research article and it was translated to both English and German languages in 1996, and it was published in the Ibn Khaldoun annual report “The civil society and Democratic Changes in the Arab world” Which was published in 1997 for