By Arsalan Iftikhar, Special to CNN
Date Posted: January 28, 2011
Editor’s note: Arsalan Iftikhar is an international human rights lawyer, founder of TheMuslimGuy.com and legal fellow for the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington.
(CNN) – President John F. Kennedy once said, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”
The recent pro-democracy mass protests around the Arab world — in places like Tunisia, Yemen and Egypt –reflect the beginnings of a “democracy Renaissance,” launched by the millions of citizens within these countries that have been ruled for decades by ruthless autocrats and soft dictators.
The recent “Jasmine Revolution” in Tunisia began with the desperate act of a young unemployed man who set himself on fire. And that passionate fire would ultimately rage against the Tunisian government machine until its long-serving president would be forced into exile two weeks ago. The young man was 26-year-old Mohammed Bouazizi, an unemployed fruit stand owner who became distraught when a policewoman confiscated his unlicensed produce stand. He died from his burns.
Following suit, several other unemployed youth around the country tried to commit suicide, and subsequent mass protests would soon topple the 23-year reign of Tunisia’s strongman, 74-year-old Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali.
Long-standing autocratic rule within the Arab world shows a “depressingly familiar pattern” in terms of regional suppression of democracy, notes Egyptian-American writer Mona Eltahawy, in a recent Washington Post opinion piece. Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi, 68 years old, has been in power since 1969; Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh (64) has ruled since 1978 and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak (82) since 1981.
Eltahawy wrote that these dinosaur political figures are “not so much fathers as grandfathers of their nations, these autocrats clinging to office — and are increasingly out of touch with their young populaces.”
Much larger than Tunisia, the nation of Egypt is home to some 80 million people — with Mubarak as its not-so-democratic leader since the assassination of Anwar Sadat in 1981. From creating a virtual police state to promoting censorship by placing all media under state control, Hosni Mubarak has spent the better part of 30 years strengthening his autocratic rule, while millions of young Egyptians remain hungry and unemployed.
Continue Reading Arsalan’s January 2011 CNN Column Here…
