by Marie Jordan
He won a third term last year in a landslide, but Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s popularity may be slipping at home even as it’s being bolstered abroad.
The 65-year-old president, who assumed the leadership of the Arab World’s most populous nation when Anwar Sadat was assassinated in 1981, has gained international prominence and praise in recent years.
His success as leader of the Arab coalition against Iraq in the Gulf War has been followed by his role in getting the Palestinian-Israeli peace talks on track.
But at the same time, Mubarak has been beset by a series of domestic worries.
An ambitious retooling of the Egyptian economy has created unemployment and 30 percent inflation in the short-run, straining the social fabric of a poor but pious population.
Unproven rumors of corruption and waste has dogged his administration, leading to an investigation by the United States Agency for International Development.
And Moslem extremists — members of the same group that gunned down Sadat — are waging a campaign of terror aimed at unseating his administration, targeting police, officials and unsuspecting tourists.
“It’s not always the case that a leader who is popular with the West is popular with his own people,” says political analyst Mustafa Amin. “I would not say Mubarak is reviled like Sadat or the Shah (of Iran), but he may not enjoy the support that Washington would like.”
Observers within Egypt say it is unlikely the small, but persistent Islamic extremist movement will be able to unseat Mubarak. But they say he must tackle domestic issues soon, or face the consequences.
The Egyptian President has always seemed to favor international policy over the domestic front.
Schools are so crowded that children attend classes in as many as three shifts a day, crowding 60 to 70 students per classroom and taught by teachers who earn an average of 20 dollars a month. Hospitals are in a state of disrepair and families of patients often must pay out of pocket for the attention of a nurse or a doctor.
And inflation has led to a sharp rise in the price of food, which has been subsidized by the government since the time of Gamal Abdel Nasser. Mubarak is attempting to cut subsidies in accordance with demands by the International Monetary Fund. But he walks a fine line, careful not to cut the lifeline of his impoverished subjects, who have rioted over bread many times in Egypt’s modern history.
Egypt has been handsomely rewarded for Mubarak’s close ties with the West. It is the second largest recipient of U.S. aid after Israel, and its support during the Gulf War led Western nations to cut Egypt’s debt by two-thirds. The IMF chipped in with a 570 million dollar loan.
But little of this money has trickled down to the poorer of Egypt’s 56 million people. That is, until now.
The streets of some of Cairo’s worst slums reverberate these days with the sound of hammers and bulldozers as government workers construct much-needed civil projects.
Egypt is also spending millions of dollars on the Salaam Canal, an irrigation project that will create thousands of acres in the Sinai Desert and room for the crowded nation to breath.
“Now you see desert, but soon, very soon, you will see farms and houses and happy people working the earth,” says construction contractor Mohammed Al-Fiki. “It is every Egyptian’s dream to own a farm.”
The government hopes to provide free farms to the poor, and increase food production.
Mubarak has promised more democratic reforms, but the onslaught of fundamentalist violence has curtailed many of the promised changes. Recently Parliament voted to extend a State of Emergency that has been in effect since Sadat’s assassination.
And Mubarak, despite protestations that he is tired of public service seems to be in for the long haul.
Marie Jordan is a “Freelance American journalist based in Egypt”.
