Law and Order Disintegrating

"There is so much tension between people over what is going on. It is like seeing gas next to a fire, but you're not sure who will set it alight.
"It's not about what will happen during those three days. It is what will happen after those three days. No one has any idea."
Mohammed Ali, Egyptian film director

Egyptians have been anxiously stock-piling food, water, cooking oil, whatever they can get their hands on, in anticipation of violence and upheaval. No one quite knows what to expect, and they are in fact, expecting the worst. The week-end, Sunday, is expected to bring the forces of opposition out on the streets to protest against President Mohammed Morsi. Counter-protests led by his supporters will confront the rebellious within Egyptian society.

The anticipated protests, with the opposition flaunting over a million signatures condemning President Morsi, arrives at the anniversary of his election triumph. And it also coincides with the arrival of Ramadan. Egyptian families are in a rush to complete their Ramadan shopping, in anticipation that shops will be closed, as a result of those protests, certain to bring chaos to the streets, and worse.

In Egypt's stifling summer heat, fraying already tight nerves, there is rising anger against the Muslim Brotherhood, the Salafists who sit beside them in parliament, and President Mohammad Morsi whose speech to the public purportedly to address the political unrest did nothing whatever to allay fears and concerns. He seems incapable of fully understanding that it is incumbent upon him to give reassurance to the fears and concerns, not further alienate by his uncompromising attitude his many detractors.

Egyptians are anticipating their daily fasts, a yearly event that this year will appear a burden. Nor will the evening repasts appear much of a celebration, given the grim mood. And the straitened pocketbooks, stretched to capacity with the added expense of Ramadan preparations. Electrical black-outs and gasoline shortages resulting in long, miserably hot line-ups as motorists try to fill up their cars only add to the anger.

But it is what will or may follow those mass protests that imbue the atmosphere with a deep sense of unease, of foreboding of what may yet come in a violent series of clashes between the polarities of public disaffection of this government. A new level of street violence, difficult to control, may ensue; how the police may react is another unknown.

And the military waits and watches, unwilling to see the country collapse into complete disorder. Prepared to act in some as-yet unknown manner should the worst be realized. Taking Egypt back to military rule does not seem a feasible option, other than as a temporary, last-resort emergency to restore public order.

"Today you see an erosion of state authority in Egypt. The state is supposed to provide security and justice; that's the most basic form of statehood. But law and order is disintegrating. In 2012, murders were up 130 percent, robberies 350 percent, and kidnappings 145 percent, according to the Interior Ministry.
"You see people being lynched in public, while others take pictures of the scene. Mind you, this is the 21st century -- not the French Revolution, wrote Nobel Peace laureate, Mohamed ElBaradei in Foreign Policy magazine.