Yesterday in this space we discussed the upcoming elections in Egypt, and the need for international observers to work alongside local organizations to ensure the fairness and accuracy of the polls. International and local observers working together would allow reports of fraud, intimidation, and other improprieties to be more easily verified, increasing the legitimacy of the observation mission.

But what if Egypt’s military continues with its ban on foreign observers, and the burden of monitoring these critical and momentous elections is placed entirely on Egyptian citizens? What are some of the ways the observation mission can be empowered and bolstered without the presence of international monitors?

• Capacity Building – While foreigners are banned from working on the ground, they can still provide training and equipment to local observers inside Egypt. It is important these capacity building missions remain disinterested toward political actors and election results in order to protect the safety of locals and the credibility of the observation mission.

• Tech Support - There are a variety of tools available for acquiring, publishing and distributing election observation data, such as mapping incidents or collecting mobile reports from citizens. Those outside Egypt can work to ensure that these tools are deployed and maintained in a way that is both accessible and intuitive to Egyptian monitors working on the ground.

• Media Focus – International news agencies can target their coverage on Egypt’s elections with a special focus on the legitimacy of the polling process. Foreign press can downplay unhelpful reporting and commentary, such as Western hand-wringing over religious parties or overemphases on the role and agency of foreign powers, while focusing instead on providing meaningful context to international viewers. What are the stakes of this election? Who are the political players, and what policies are to be decided? Answering these and other questions will allow the international audience to truly understand – and respond accordingly to – Egypt’s election.

• Citizen Media – Citizens on the ground, using mobile phones, digital cameras, laptops, and all manner of multimedia tools, can harness the power of the press for themselves in order to document the election process. This allows not only local civil society and monitoring organizations but individual citizens themselves to publish their findings and tell their own story to the world without relying on mainstream institutions. Citizen media is flexible enough to operate in particularly dangerous (or plainly unwelcoming) environments, such as a repressive police state. And yet, provided with the right skill sets, it is still high quality enough to deliver substantive journalism with the timeliness and impact required for monitoring this critical election.

• Education – Egyptian citizens must be educated on the specifics of the election process, including not only procedure (How do you register? Where is your polling station?) but also the issues at stake (Who are the candidates? What is their platform?) and the obligations of individuals and the government (What are your rights? How do you spot illegal campaigning or fraud?). This education can be done in a variety of ways, from using traditional social networks, such as family, classmates, and religious communities, to tapping digital social networking like Facebook and Twitter. As witnessed during the anti-Mubarak uprisings earlier this year, Egypt’s communities are more than capable of disseminating information and coordinating activities amongst the population. This power can be harnessed again to ensure a fully equipped and informed electorate on voting day.

There are several examples of where election monitoring can be conducted in less than ideal circumstances, be it in police states with no access to foreign observers or in conflict zones with very little infrastructure and media access. Here are a few:

Afghan2010

Map Muraqeb

FEFA 2010

Monitoring elections is an incredibly complex and difficult task, particularly in this case with the crucial and unprecedented post-revolutionary elections in Egypt.

What are some of the other ways both the international community and Egyptian citizens can work to ensure a free and fair election? We will continue to monitor this story closely, and your suggestions, comments, and solutions are welcomed.

//Photo by Bikyamasr.com

The Egyptian cultural center in Paris was host to a seminar by the prominent Egyptian writer Gamal al Ghitani (Al Zeini Barakat, Hikayat al Gharib) , entitled "L'Egypte de l'apès 25 Janvier 2011", or "Egypt after the 25th of January 2011". The seminar also featured the participation of Egypt's ambassador to France, Mr. Nasser Kamel on the subject of the diaspora's right to vote.

The center, which is essentially one large hall in avenue Saint-Michel, was fully packed, the audience being mostly composed of Egyptians living in Paris, with a not-insignificant presence of French as well as other-Arab audience.

(A word of caution – this account is written mostly from memory and not necessarily in the right order that Mr. al-Ghitani presented. I hope, though, that what I've written here covers most of the points raised in the seminar. )

Mr. al-Ghitani started his talk by an admission: Prior to the revolution, he had never heard of Facebook and still is not exactly sure what it is. As such, when the young writers and employees of the journal in which he is editor-in-chief -Akhbar al-Adab – told him about demonstrations being organized on the Internet, he assumed it not to be serious, especially as he had witnessed several demonstrations in the near past that usually fizzled out within a few hour.

"The Egyptian revolution did not come out of vacuum, in the past ten years there had been quite a bit of movement and several demonstrations defying Mubarak's authority. However, they were mostly isolated and often associated with short-term demands, such as improving workers' conditions in the fabric industry of Mahalla"

"One of the breakthroughs was with the movement Kifaya "Enough", which was a movement mostly comprising intellectuals and academics. Kifaya was the first to present an open political challenge to the legitimacy of Mubarak. However, when Kifaya called for a demonstration against the the unemployment, I went expecting to see a million people, since there are legions upon legions of the unemployed in Egypt. To my surprise, there weren't more than 500 people!"

"The other significant movement was that led by the association of the judges of Egypt, which demonstrated against the sham elections that took place in the past 10 years."

"However, the gatherings and demonstrations were often short-lived and never really gathered steam, so I wasn't expecting much from a movement that starts on the Internet."

"The 25th of January, I heard that the youth had taken to the street and were being confronted by the state security forces, so I figured that that was that. However, at the end of the day, I was told that they were still on the street and that pitched battles were taking place, and suddenly the numbers started growing into the thousands and tens of thousands. Right there and then, it finally dawned on me that something extraordinary was happening."

Mr. al-Ghitani proceeded to talk about the brave battles and the desperate attempts from the demonstrators to take move the battle from the alleys and small streets right into Tahreer (Liberation) square in the middle of Cairo. This was beyond just a symbolic move, as the Tahreer square is really the beating heart of Cairo.

"On the historical side, the Tahreer square is the place from which the funeral of Abdul-Mun'em Riyad (army commander in the war of attrition, who died on the battlefield in 1969), and Umm Kulthoum" (egypt's most famous singer, the singer of the revolution) proceeded. "And Nasser's funeral passed through the Tahreer square too".

"All the ministries surround Tahreer square, as does the national museum, the symbol of Egypt's glory, and the American University, symbol of education". In short, when Cairo was re-designed by the Khedewy Ismail, it was modeled after Paris and the Tahreer square was designed as the center, just as the Place Etoile is the center of Paris. "All this was not lost on the youth who fought tooth and nail to reach the square and take it over"

Mr. Ghitani had plenty of praise for the youth, and their discipline and organization that allowed them to confront the state security and prevail, even though the disappearance of all security and police forces from the street was still a mystery to him, and probably a ploy to instill chaos especially when coupled with the release of the prisoners and the letting loose of state-sponsored thugs on the streets.

He next proceeded to compare this revolution to that of 1919, which witnessed a similar mobilization of nearly the entire population of Egypt, even though in that revolution there was a clear head, a revered symbol in Saad Zaghlool, while this one had no head or leader.

The former president, Hosni Mubarak, received his fair share of criticism, although Mr. al-Ghitani told an anecdote in which he saw Mubarak in a book fair during the early days of his presidency, and noticed they wearing the same vest, which cost no more than 50 Egyptian pounds (about 10 dollars) at the time. When he asked the president about it, he said that it covers him as well as the most expensive suit. "Compare that to these last few years, in which he had hundreds of suits flown in at a time from London and Paris!"

" President Sadat's policy of uncontrolled economic openness led to disasters to the Egyptian economy and to unparalleled poverty, and I was no fan of Sadat, wrote against him and suffered for it. However, I have to say that neither did he seek to install his son after him, nor did he allow his children to indulge in business dealings. What Mubarak did by letting his sons meddle in business and the economy of the country was a crime."

As the author moved to describe the last days of Mubarak's reign, he stressed that this revolution was still on-going and not over. On the other hand, he had high praise for the army and said that when he heard that the high council of the armed forces was in a state of "permanent convention", he knew it was game over.

"By the end, when the protesters decided to move to the presidential palace, I feared a massacre, but I later figured out that at that time, the army gave Mubarak one of two choices: Either you resign, or we arrest you on the spot."

"The army of Egypt is a patriotic organization that never pointed its guns on the people. Have you ever heard of a place in the world where the army allows people to climb over the tanks and write on their walls "Down with the president?" Also, where else would the army bow to the wishes of the people and remove the prime minister (Shafik) and install one that the people desire (Sharaf)… The army does not want to rule, they are dying to go back to the barracks as soon as a democratically elected president takes over."

During the question and answer session, Mr. al-Ghitani was asked who he prefers as a new president. To the cheers of many, he indirectly pointed at Amr Moussa as being a "75 year old employee of Mubarak" who will be a disaster for Egypt. He also took a swipe at el-Baradei (but got his age wrong) when he said "someone who is nearly 80 and hadn't lived in Egypt for a long time shouldn't be president." "Are we so lacking in Egypt that we only have these two as choices for a president?" He said he wants to see a president emerge from the youth who led the revolution. "Remember, Nasser was 34 on the eve of the 1952 revolution."

On answering the question of whether he prefers parliamentary or presidential elections first, he said he'd prefer a transitional council mixed between military and civilians, to oversee things for 1-2 years until the leaders of the youth movement emerge and are ready to take over. "Let’s not overcook things and elect a president within a few months lest we end up with another dictator."

With regard to the second article of the constitution, which stipulates that Islam is the religion of the state, he said he is against it as he advocates a fully civil state. He also said that the Muslim Brotherhood should be treated just as any other political party to see what their true representation is within the population. "However, if we hold the elections right here and now with no other true political party having emerged yet, the elections will be skewed in their favor."

At the end of the seminar, Egypt's ambassador to France took over to address the issue of diaspora voting. He said he'd had extensive discussions with his superiors, and that while everyone acknowledges that 8 million Egyptians who contribute a 15% share to the Egyptian economy deserve the full rights of voting, the matter has to be addressed properly. The parliamentary elections will be the most challenging to organize since it raises several question: Should the expats vote based on their district of origin or based on a certain quota for expats? Will the embassies oversee the elections, or will it require judiciary supervision? Mr. Kamel added that while there were lots of issues to sort out for parliamentary elections, which will take time, the voting in the presidential elections should be easier to organize in the embassies and he hoped to see it implemented in the very near future.

Provided by @ihagha

English:

What is this people? what is going on in Egypt, again? we had said enough and Allah had blessed us but it is this bastard, dirty dog Mubarak and his family…and this deceitful gang…I mean, what can I say? I will tell you if one sees them one wishes to kill them …. this gang that is corrupt … sitting in Egypt doing what? is he enjoying your sustenance? he is enjoying his life while you are killing each other. And that bastard and his kids and wife,are still sitting in Egypt? And they still have their personal guards! Haven’t you asked yourselves why they are being guarded? and who is guarding them? The army is guarding them! …. the Army has begun to show us that its leadership is, to such deep regret, an empty leadership but God suffices for me and he is the best to depend on.

Translated by @amerghazal and @badrgirl