Different Regime, Same Repression in Sisi’s Egypt

The Great Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha in Cairo’s Citadel. The Medieval fortification will be refurbished under Sisi’s administration Cr: Anonymous

By: Nathan Matsko

State College — Egyptians have seen innumerable changes to their lives over the past decade. In the 2011 Revolution, long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak was toppled, resulting in democratic elections that voted in Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi and his government were then later ousted at the hands of General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in 2013. Since then, any hope for significant reform from the Arab Spring has been quickly smoldered. Sisi, now in his second term, has followed in his predecessors’ footsteps by curtailing individual rights and liberties.

Since Sisi became the de facto leader of Egypt, he has cracked down on all forms of expression and speech, just as Morsi did during his short-lived presidency, and Mubarak had done for three decades before him. Under the guise of responding to threats against national security, the Egyptian military regularly arrests citizens for dissenting opinions. While similar to his predecessors, Sisi’s government is unique in its ability to closely monitor social media, censor websites, and regulate streaming content deemed unfit for public consumption.

The media is essentially a mouthpiece for the government, and any sort of dissent, even when done by individual means, is not met with a warm reception. Reporters Without Borders has referred to Egypt as “One of the world’s biggest prisons for Journalists”, as the country is ranked 163rd out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index. The government regularly arrests journalists and raids news agencies for spreading what is deemed “false news”. Egypt arrested 26 journalists in 2019 alone according to a figure by the Committee to Protect Journalists. A prominent journalist has already gone missing within the first month of 2020.

Political activists and opponents are regularly targeted by the government. Protests, especially--but not exclusively--leading up to the 2018 Presidential election in which many experts and commentators have called a sham, are usually met with violence and arrests at the hands of security forces. Those that are arrested are usually charged with crimes that allow them to be tried in military courts. Political opponents of Sisi who had criticized him at protests prior to the election met the same fate. A string of anti-corruption protests in late 2019 saw a mass arrest of over four thousand individuals, with countless reports of torture at the hands of security forces, according to Human Rights Watch.

Human rights defenders are often arbitrarily arrested merely for their social media posts. Such was the case for Mouna al-Mazbouh and Amal Fathy, who merely posted about sexual harassment that they had experienced. Egypt’s LGBT community regularly faces arrests on the basis of their sexuality and gender identity, per Amnesty International.

Sisi’s government has both failed to protect religious minorities and has enforced discrimination against them. Amnesty International again points out that Egypt’s Coptic Christian population has faced severe persecution in the forms of attacks and harassment, and the perpetrators are rarely charged or prosecuted.

The Egyptian government has refused to grant registrations to countless churches in the country, which often leads to their demolition. Out of over 3000 building permit applications for churches, only several hundred have been approved by the government. Atheists, Shi’a Muslims, and Baha'i are also targeted for arrest for various reasons, and face similar issues of violence and harassment without much, if any, help from the government.

Some lawmakers were pushing as recently as 2018 to criminalize atheism, taking blasphemy laws to a new level in the country. The Egyptian government has also been known to close down the Al-Hussein Mosque, one of the holiest Islamic sites in Egypt, leading up to the Shi’a Holiday of Ashura.

Egypt hoped to see change and establishment of democracy after their revolution that gripped the world. Many brave activists and journalists have put their lives on the line to see this change.

Yet, Sisi seems like less of a shocking change and more of a return to a time before the revolution, in which Mubarak ruled Egypt with an iron fist. Sisi, however, has learned from the mistakes of his predecessors, and will not allow any slight against his rule to go unpunished, lest it grows into another revolution.