Cairo: Egypt’s embattled President Mohammad Mursi has wooed the army in a speech he gave days before a protest campaign planned by the opposition at the weekend calling for his ouster.

“The state institutions, mainly the Armed Forces, work with harmony and discipline under the head of the state’s leadership,” Mursi said late Wednesday in a speech marking the completion of his first year in office.

He lashed out at reports that he is at odds with the army. “The [army] men are remote from all tortuous ways. The Armed Forces will continue to be Egypt’s protective shield,” Mursi added as Defence Minister Abdul Fatah Al Sissi sat in the first row of an invited audience during the televised address.

Mursi picked Al Sissi for the post last August to replace the veteran defence minister Hussain Tantawi.

In a toughly worded statement earlier this week, Al Sissi warned that a political dispute between Mursi, who hails from the powerful Muslim Brotherhood, and the secular-minded opposition, is jeopardising national security. The defence chief also warned that the army could intervene to prevent the country from “sliding into a dark tunnel”.

“Mursi’s wooing gestures towards the army are not surprising,” said Helmi Farouq, a military expert. “He realizes well that the army is probably the only state institution in Egypt, which is still strong,” he told Gulf News. “Mursi clearly hopes that the army will not take the side of the protesters.”

A decision by the army’s generals in early 2011 not to back the then president Hosni Mubarak when he faced mass protests precipitated his downfall. “By lavishly praising the army, Mursi still remembers how the generals behaved during the revolution against Mubarak,” said Farouq.

Mursi’s four predecessors, who ruled Egypt for more than 60 years, were from the army.

The army has deployed this week troops and armoured vehicles in several areas across the nation to secure key state institutions ahead of Sunday’s protests, which will demand Mursi to step down and call early presidential elections.

The opposition accuses Mursi, who is Egypt’s first democratically elected president, of betraying the revolution that brought him to power.

Increasingly apprehensive about the possibility that the country’s turmoil could descend into chaos, many Egyptians look eager to see the army back in power. Private TV stations, which are usually critical of Mursi, have seen the people greeting army troops as they took position on the nation’s streets.

“The Armed Forces belong to the people, not to Mursi or his clan [the Brotherhood],” said Hassan Mandour, a government employee.

Hundreds of pro-military opponents of Mursi have been camping for almost a week outside the Defence Ministry in Cairo, calling for the army to remove Mursi.

The military took over following Mubarak’s toppling and ruled the country for 16 fraught months until last June when it handed over power to Mursi.

“ Even with its limited political experience, the army will be much better than Mursi,” said Mandour.