Mohamed Mursi: a Footnote in Egypt's History

(Bloomberg Opinion) -- There is a special poignancy to the fact that Egypt’s only democratically elected ruler should have died as a prisoner and been buried without ceremony. This was not the end I could have imagined for Mohamed Mursi the last time I saw him, in December 2012, posing for photographs in a presidential palace.

Seated uncomfortably in a chintz chair while the photographer’s lights popped around him, Mursi had seemed an almost forlorn figure, shrunken by the grandeur of his surroundings. But it was not the pomp of the buildings that diminished him as much as the office of the presidency: Less than five months since being sworn in, he was already proving unequal to the task.

Over in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, many of the young Egyptians whose protests had brought down the dictatorship were now calling for Mursi to step down. To them, the sweeping emergency powers he had claimed for himself seemed to augur a new dictatorship; some even dubbed the president “the new pharaoh.” They wanted a proper democracy, along with an immediate revival of the sclerotic economy – and they wanted it now.

It is possible that no politician could have fulfilled the urgent aspirations of the teeming masses gathered in the square, but Mursi was uniquely unqualified for the job. A lifelong member of the Muslim Brotherhood, his role in the higher echelons of the Islamist organization was that of a backroom operator, a hod-carrier for more powerful men. He had only become his party’s standard-bearer for the presidency when its first choice was disqualified from the race.

Although he could be gracious in one-and-one encounters, Mursi had none of the skills of a retail politician. He was a poor speaker, plainly uneasy in crowds. Nor did he have any feel for the mood of his nation. A more adroit leader might have placated the Tahrir Square protesters, and used their pro-democratic ardor as a shield against the illiberal institutions of the old dictatorship – the military, the courts, and the vast bureaucracy. But Morsi’s apparent power grab repelled the crowds, and their rage became a weapon in the hands of the deep state.

Before his fall, there had been tantalizing glimpses of what might have been. As I wrote after our last meeting, Mursi had become the most important man in the Middle East, as much for what he represented – the possibility that the Arab world’s largest nation could be a functioning democracy – as for some of his early achievements. For instance, by brokering a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, he had reassured those in the West who had been anxious that an Islamist leader in Cairo would empower the terrorist group to commit more violence.

But Mursi’s failure to reassure his own people would undermine his presidency and, arguably, democracy in Egypt. Seven months after our last meeting, he was ousted from office. Outraged by what they saw as an Islamist power-grab, many pro-democracy protesters cheered the coup, and appeared relieved when General Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi restored the military’s domination of Egyptian politics.

In time, political analysts would grow more charitable toward Mursi’s year-long presidency. With the benefit of hindsight, he would appear less an autocrat than a bungler, out of his depth in shark-infested seas. But ordinary Egyptians appear not to have made such a reassessment. Calls for protests to mark his death have gone largely unheeded.

Sisi now looks on course to remain Egypt’s president at least until 2030, with far more power than Mursi could possibly have imagined. The Muslim Bortherhood is a shell of its former self, outlawed and pursued by the state. There is little other opposition of any consequence. 

Mursi, having suffered appalling conditions in incarceration, is now gone, perhaps destined to be a footnote in Egypt’s political history. For now, that also seems to be the fate of democracy in the country.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Edward Evans at eevans3@bloomberg.net

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

Bobby Ghosh is a columnist and member of the Bloomberg Opinion editorial board. He writes on foreign affairs, with a special focus on the Middle East and the wider Islamic world.

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