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I guess all adolescents pass through that phase when the body begins transforming from boyhood to manhood, when all of a sudden you begin noticing girls, become conscious of how you talk to them, when you draft endless love letters in the dead of night, many of which never reach their intended recipients.

It was during those heady days of high testosterone, pitifully short wet dreams and conflicting emotions that I wrote one of my shortest poems. One of about 150 plus still to be published — whether they will be published I don’t know because I never tried to share what I considered my private thoughts.
Anyway the poem went thus:
After the applause;
Silence.
That’s it, just those four words.

This little poem, so pregnant with meaning and interpretation, came to my mind as I watched the jubilation that spread across Cairo’s Tahrir (Freedom) Square, when news filtered through that Egyptian strongman Hosni Mubarak had stepped down after 30 years in power. Thirty years of being a de facto chief executive officer of the United States presiding over a conglomerate called Egypt.
I wondered what would follow the applause that rang out across Tahrir Square, elation that was ironically punctuated by Chants of ‘‘Mubarak! Mubarak! Mubarak!’’ (Arabic for Blessed one). The protesters were congratulating themselves but they clearly had no reason to celebrate as the real work was just beginning.

Yes, they had deposed poor old Mubarak, but was he the problem?
I am in no way trying to separate Mubarak from the problems in Egypt for having presided over the country for 30 years he certainly played a big role in making Egypt what it is today. Neither am I trying to belittle the significance of the 18Day Tahrir Square Uprising, not revolution please as it served to show the dangers of politics of Western appeasement, itself a worthy lesson for some of our greenhorn politicians here.

Egyptians ousted their Westernbacked leader, and as much as Western media touted it as a revolution, Mubarak’s ouster was far from that. A real revolution goes beyond a mere change of guard but manifests in the transformation of institutions and consequently transfer of the means of production from a privileged class to the disenfranchised.
By dint of this, a revolution basically addresses the grievances that would have spawned it which is why our Three Chimurenga Wars here qualified to be called revolutions as they served to decimate a repressive racist, settler system and transfer the means of production from approximately 6 000 white commercial farmers to hundreds of thousands of previously disadvantaged black Zimbabweans.
In Egypt, that is highly unlikely given the way the US, which has so much to lose or gain from Tahrir Square, has quickly moved in to secure its interests; and I bet my trillions of bearer cheques in a drawer back home that Uncle Sam will have a lot to say about who eventually emerges from Mubarak’s ashes.

Already there are feverish attempts to plant one Muhammad El Baradei, former head of the UN Atomic Energy Agency, a man who fits the role Uncle Sam wishes to thrust him in like a cheap suit would a world class model.

But what went wrong in Egypt? A country whose leader had an open line to the White House, a country that was rivalled only by Israel in terms of donor funding from the US and was at par only with Tunisia in terms of Foreign Direct Investment inflows?
How come the impressive growth indicators, GDP and GNP, did not translate into an improvement in the life of the common man in the slums of Cairo?

The reason: That “wealth” was not in Egyptian hands but reposed in the hands of Western corporations that used Egypt as a sweat shop and market for their produce. The American aid, which was largely military, was all about securing the interests of Israel in an increasingly hostile, Arabdominated Maghreb and Middle East.
So much for Western appeasement, and there in is a lesson for the MDC leadership and their sheepish followers.

Western appeasement does not automatically translate to an improvement in livelihoods; only peoplecentred policies like the land reform programme and the indigenisation and economic empowerment drive transfer wealth to the majority and build a nation. And this is the onerous task that faces whoever takes over from Mubarak. He has to pacify the restive mass in Tahrir Square and across the length and breadth of Egypt. And one can’t do that without rocking the Western boat.

Will Mubarak’s successor have the guts to rock the cradle to make the Egyptian economy truly Egyptian or will it be more of the same, just a new face in Mubarak’s palatial residence?
I remain to be convinced.
Perhaps a revolution will manifest in Egypt in the fullness of time time, but for now the applause in Tahrir Square is likely to be followed by deafening silence. As long as Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton continue dictating their wishes to Egyptians the 18Day siege of Tahrir Square will go down as a footnote in history.

What has happened in Egypt so far is not different from what happened in Tunisia. The baton has moved from Mubarak to Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, his sidekick, the same way it moved from Ben Ali to his sidekick, Premier Mohamed Ghannouchi.

Mubarak’s establishment is still firmly in charge with the army at the helm and behind Egypt’s new military rulers is Uncle Sam’s avaricious face of course, and he is dictating the direction events should take. And as the recipient of massive US military aid, the Egyptian army is an extension of the US military machine.
Reports indicate that over Mubarak’s 30year reign, Uncle Sam pumped US$35 billion in military aid into the Egyptian army, trained Egyptian officers at US defence colleges, and carried out major military operations to destabilise the Middle East from Egyptian bases.

Can this superstructure be deposed by Internet activists and the rabble from Tahrir Square, particularly as the US appears to be dictating things behind the scenes? What with US thinktanks talking about providing funds to help set up secular parties ostensibly to ringfence the Moslem Brotherhood?
Only time will tell.
If these USled machinations are all that Tahrir Square produced after 18 days, then Egyptians will soon realise that what they will get is just a change of the name of their leader from Mubarak to Baradei or whoever Uncle Sam anoints to safeguard his interests in the Arab oilrich region.
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