Some Arab Leaders In A State Of Denial

Fawaz Turki writes: Their people crave to live in communities similar to those around the world with an established rule of law
This commentary was published in The Gulf News on 10/04/2011

The evident fact: In several countries in the Arab world, ordinary Arabs' alienation from their social, political and economic life had reached a critical mass. The end result: In an outpouring of this sentiment, these ordinary Arabs took to the streets demanding the ouster of regimes that had denied them their right to a decent life, liberty and, well yes, the pursuit of happiness.

The official explanation: The b***h set them up.  The b***h in question refers to the time back in 1990 when Mayor Marion Barry, caught red-handed, in an FBI sting operation, smoking crack cocaine with a lady friend (who had been cooperating with the Feds) exploded: "The b***h set me up". Never mind that Barry, the mayor of Washington, DC, the most influential capital in the world, was breaking the law by smoking crack, a felony offence. What mattered to him was that he was ‘set up'.

 So it is with a great many of these Arab leaders today whose regimes have been toppled, or are about to be, in this remarkable, indeed historic, Arab Spring, leaders who have opted to blame others for the spontaneous uprisings in their countries, rather than see them as genuine expressions of mass discontent and a call by their people for social justice and freedom.

Soon after Tunisians rose up in revolt against his regime, the now ousted Tunisian president Zine Al Abidine Bin Ali blamed the rebellion on ‘outside agitators' and ‘terrorists'. To former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, the mass of people gathered in Tahrir Square were organised by ‘Islamist radicals', hidden forces' and other shady characters with a nefarious agenda. In Yemen, according to the country's head of state, Ali Abdullah Saleh, the tens of thousands of demonstrators calling for the ouster of his regime, were in like manner ‘misguided elements', ‘foreigners' and ‘armed groups' who promoted ‘outside interests' inimical to Yemen's progress. And in Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, ‘the brother leader', comically explained that the uprising in his country was fomented by ‘Al Qaida elements' who were distributing alcohol and hallucinogenic drugs to the rebels in Benghazi, presumably turning its streets into a latter-day Haight-Ashbury.

Now it is the Syrian regime's turn to give Syria's own nascent protest movement, which broke out in Daraa, Damascus, Hama, Latakia and other cities, its own brand name. In a much anticipated speech recently, delivered before assembled members of parliament, the Syrian president blamed the unrest on ‘dupes' and ‘plotters' who were conspiring with unnamed outside agents to ‘divide and weaken' Syria, the ‘champion of Arab nationalism'. He did not, as had been hoped by pro-democracy activists, announce the repeal of Syria's ‘emergency rules' that, for almost five decades, had stifled civil liberties, suppressed the public debate and guaranteed a monopoly on political life by the ruling Baath Party. About the demonstrations in Daraa, where dozens were killed by security forces, he told legislators, presumably with a straight face: "The people of Daraa are the people of patriotism and the people of pan-Arab nationalism, [for] they would not have risen up had they not been tricked." At this you simply roll your eyes.

Freedom of expression

One thing is plain: Arabs, especially those living in impoverished and repressed societies, have reached the limits of their human endurance. They crave to live in communities similar to those others around the world with an established rule of law, where political leaders are held to account for their actions, and where citizens need not fear retribution for openly expressing their views. Such societies acquiesce to the idea of free public discourse not only because it is guaranteed by the law of the land, but because their political culture values the notion that freedom of expression is a necessary function of a dynamic, strong and progressive polity. As Charles Bradlaugh, the 19th century activist and parliamentarian wrote: "Better a thousandfold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech."

In the face of it all, these modern-day heads of state — long consumed by their self-image as indispensable ‘brother leaders' whose citizens are forever expected to obey rather than think — are in denial, a well-known affliction in therapy where a person, faced with a fact too uncomfortable to accept, rejects it outright, insisting that it is not true, despite what may be overwhelming evidence to support its verity.

These self-aggrandising rulers in question ("Brother Leader Muammar Gaddafi", a government spokesman in Tripoli grandiosely told foreign reporters last Sunday, "belongs not only to Libyans, he belongs to humankind") continue to want to deny that reality is real, that the Arab Spring has arrived, and that from it a thousand ideas will bloom, if not in this decade, then in the next generation.

Well, if these Arab leaders, who are in denial, can't swallow facts, let them eat fiction. And we'll see for how long that will sustain them.

Fawaz Turki is a journalist, lecturer and author based in Washington. He is the author of The Disinherited: Journal of a Palestinian Exile.