Mursi-military wrangling takes a turn

Cairo: Simultaneous salutes by the head of the powerful military council and his deputy to Egypt’s first civilian and Islamist president Mohammad Mursi at an inaugural ceremony gave many Egyptians the impression that the power struggle between the two sides is over. Experts believe otherwise.

“The crisis will remain there until the military and the new president reach a final agreement on the complementary constitutional declaration,” said Amr Hashem, an expert at the state-run Al Ahram Centre for Strategic Studies, referring to a temporary constitution perceived to tighten the army’s grip on power and curtail presidential authority.

In an impassionate address to thousands of anti-military protesters in Tahrir Square on Friday — a day before he took office, Mursi pledged to retrieve all presidential powers stripped by the generals.

The military, which took over after Hosni Mubarak’s removal in a popular revolt last year, formally handed over power to the new president on Saturday. However, under the temporary constitution, the generals led by Field Marshal Hussain Tantawi, Mubarak’s long-standing defence minister, retook the legislative powers after the country’s highest court dissolved the Islamist-dominated parliament last month.

“The wrangling is still there between the generals and the president despite the public praise exchanged by the two sides at the military ceremony held to inaugurate Mursi,” said Salah Al Hadi, a political expert.

“All what has happened is that the struggle for self-assertion between Mursi and his Muslim Brotherhood on the one hand and the military on the other has become less open and more sophisticated,” he added.

Egypt’s four former presidents, since monarchy was overthrown 60 years ago, were from the army. In his inaugural address, Mursi, an engineering professor, commended the army as the “nation’s shield and sword”, saying it fulfilled a promise “not to be an alternative to the people’s will”.

“Mursi is still a rookie president trying to please everyone,” said Mamdouh Attia, a military expert. “The military knows this, but it will not cede its powers, mainly the legislative authority, until a new parliament is elected. I think an agreement on this was reached between the military and the president despite the [street] protests led by the Muslim Brotherhood against the powers kept by the military,” he added.

A crowd of demonstrators are camping out in Tahrir to protest the military powers and the dissolution of parliament.

“The good words spoken by President Mursi about the Armed Forces should not be interpreted as appeasement to the military council,” said Mahmoud Ghuzlan, a senior Brotherhood official. “The president earlier pointed out that his disagreement is with the military council, not the army, whom he has pledged to strengthen it.”

Field Marshal Tantawi is widely expected to keep his post as defence minister in a new government being formed by Mursi. The temporary constitution, meanwhile, authorises the generals to be solely in charge of running the army’s affairs and appointing its commanders.