When we met, Ali ElBaradei defended his brother. After all, Dr. ElBaradei had stated from the start that he was not a savior. We, the young people, must work harder to collect signatures for the petition, Ali argued. Although the meeting added no tangible dimension to my overall strategy, I once again felt partially relieved after expressing my opinion.
My performance at Google declined significantly during this period, but my manager was still happy. Before I got busy with ElBaradei’s Facebook page, I would sometimes spend up to fifteen consecutive hours a day finishing a project, or finalizing a marketing plan for a new product, or simply brainstorming with fellow employees on new ideas for the region. Understandably, my quarterly performance reports at Google always stated that I needed to improve my work-life balance.
Yet my wife was incredibly supportive. From the very beginning, she had known that she was marrying a workaholic who was addicted to living online. Occasionally she would remind me that I needed to give more time and attention to my family. I tried from time to time to improve, but I must admit that no matter how hard I tried, I would always relapse.
The state’s campaign to control ElBaradei’s growing popularity became fierce. Security authorities had previously issued orders that banned ElBaradei from appearing on Egyptian media. Now private television channels that had previously besieged him for interviews also kept their distance. Coverage in the print media was not as bad as on television, but ElBaradei’s news was now featured a lot less than before. Public opinion fell victim to this campaign, particularly as ElBaradei did not make a habit of refuting baseless allegations. Many Egyptians didn’t know about the media ban. The only remaining outlet was the Internet. The Twitter account was his favorite channel on which to vent, even though his follow count did not compare to the number of followers of traditional media outlets.
As the situation reached this dire point, I got an idea, inspired by a popular Google product that had been utilized by election campaigns in other parts of the world. Google Moderator is a tool that gives the user the ability to solicit questions from an unlimited number of other users and subsequently to rank these questions based on popularity votes so that they can be answered accordingly. What a cool way to democratize feedback!
I presented the concept of Google Moderator to Ali ElBaradei and explained what it could mean for the campaign. Using this service to hold an event would reach a vast number of Internet users, the majority of whom would be young people whom the NDP had never communicated with in any genuine way. Dr. ElBaradei welcomed the idea and said he was ready to implement it as soon as he came back from a trip abroad.
The initiative was announced on his Facebook page in mid-May 2010. It was called “Ask ElBaradei.” The number of fans on the page had now reached 150,000, of whom more than 2,700 participated. They posted 1,300 questions that received about 60,000 votes. It was an astonishing outpouring. Ironically and in contrast, Gamal Mubarak’s team had initiated an Internet dialogue shortly before this and asked interested people to send their questions before attending the event. Of course, it was all scripted in advance and the questions were carefully selected.
I wondered what would happen if President Mubarak were to receive questions from Internet users. Would his aides be able to accept clear and direct questions without the usual politicking and deception? The answer was obvious.
The questions for Dr. ElBaradei were profound. Many of the questions that received the highest number of votes revealed anxiety about the follow-up to the signature-collecting campaign. The most important questions were: How will the signatures collected be useful? What is Plan B, if the regime refuses nonviolent change after we collect a large number of signatures? How can we reach rural parts of Egypt to spread awareness about change? Will you take Egypt toward secular governance? What is your position on the second article of the constitution, which states clearly that the Islamic Sharia is the nation’s main source of legislation? What are the priorities of your presidential agenda? Finally, Do you eat kushari? (Kushari, made of rice, lentils, and pasta, is a very affordable and popular daily meal for many Egyptians.) It was clear that many people simply needed reassurance that ElBaradei was “one of us.”
Together with other coordinators of ElBaradei’s campaign, we filtered the questions and began searching for an interviewer who would address these questions to Dr. ElBaradei. Our search was not easy. Everyone we asked refused to play this role; some attributed it to personal reasons or prior commitments, and others said they were afraid of the consequences. In the end, we decided that the campaign’s own Mostafa al-Nagar should be the interviewer. The interview was viewed by more than 100,000 online users.
Dr. ElBaradei tried to remain optimistic in his responses. Instead of appearing frustrated at the limited number of signatures and blaming people’s passive attitudes, he spoke about proactivity and the importance of joining forces for the sake of Egypt’s future. The man was inspiring in his presentation of a better tomorrow. The regime cannot resist the people’s demands for long, he said.
Dr. ElBaradei was blessed with optimism. Every time things seemed dark, he beamed with hope and asserted that change was coming. One famous opposition journalist, known for his sarcasm, commented, “He must know something that we do not.” And it turned out that he obviously did.
ElBaradei had it right all along: we did not need a savior; we had to do this ourselves.
3
“Kullena Khaled Said”
ON JUNE 8, 2010, while browsing on Facebook, I saw a shocking image that a friend of mine had posted on my wall. The picture linked to the official Facebook account of Dr. Ayman Nour, the former presidential candidate who was a political activist. It was a horrifying photo showing the distorted face of a man in his twenties. There was a big pool of blood behind his head, which rested on a chunk of marble. His face was extremely disfigured and bloodied; his lower lip had been ripped in half, and his jaw was seemingly dislocated. His front teeth appeared to be missing, and it looked as if they had been beaten right out of his mouth. The image was so gruesome that I wondered if he had been wounded in war. But by accessing Dr. Nour’s page I learned that Khaled Mohamed Said had apparently been beaten to death on June 6 by two secret police officers in Alexandria.
My first reaction was denial. I could not believe that anyone could actually inflict such brutality on someone else. The victim was a twenty-eight-year-old from Alexandria. According to eyewitnesses, some dispute had erupted between him and the two officers, leading to their physical assault on him, which claimed the young man’s life.
I felt miserable, frustrated, and outraged. This was all the result of a political situation that rendered security forces loyal servants of an oppressive regime. Some of our law enforcement personnel had mutated into vicious monsters who were immune from punishment and prone to committing atrocities. They abandoned the Egyptian ethic of goodness that has pervaded our society for centuries.