[A-List] Egyptian Islamists Join Call for General Strike

["Yoshie Furuhashi" <critical.montages@xxxxxxxxx>]

May 4 happens to be my birthday as well.  ;-> -- Yoshie

<http://africa.reuters.com/wire/news/usnL29744401.html>
Egyptian Islamists join call for general strike
Tue 29 Apr 2008, 15:06 GMT
(Adds inflation figures, paragraph 4)

By Jonathan Wright

CAIRO, April 29 (Reuters) - The Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's largest
opposition group, on Tuesday joined the campaign for a general strike
against the government on May 4, the 80th birthday of long-serving
president Hosni Mubarak.

Brotherhood leader Mohamed Mahdi Akef said people should stay at home
on that day "in peaceful protest to demand solutions to the crises and
to tackle the deteriorating conditions which the people are
suffering".

"The Muslim Brotherhood is against public policies which entrench
corruption and despotism ... The executive has blocked its ears and
shut its eyes to all calls for reform," he added.

The prestige of the ruling establishment has been shaken over the past
year by an increased number of labour strikes demanding higher wages
to face inflation which has hit 14.4 percent in the year to March.
Food prices from dairy goods to cooking oils have also hit record
highs.

A group of activists, mainly leftists and liberals, agitated for a
national strike on April 6 to coincide with a strike by textile
workers in the Nile Delta town of Mahalla al-Kubra, without much
success outside the town itself.

The Brotherhood, which can mobilise larger crowds than any other
opposition force in Egypt, did not actively back that strike,
depriving the protest movement of crucial support.

Advocates of a May 4 strike, grouped on the social networking system
Facebook, are demanding a minimum wage, salary rises linked to
inflation, legislation and other measures to control prices, and the
release of people detained in Mahalla.

Two people were killed and more than 150 injured in Mahalla in riots
spread over two days.

The government, on the defensive after recent big jumps in food
prices, quickly offered the Mahalla workers more money. Prime Minister
Ahmed Nazif has promised that public-sector workers will get pay rises
of at least 20 percent in July.

The main Facebook group promoting the strike now has close to 74,000
members, up from about 60,000 a month ago.

The Muslim Brotherhood did not state in detail the political demands
behind the strike but the Islamist movement has been in the forefront
of calls for fair elections and the rule of law.

The Brotherhood has borne the brunt of a government crackdown on many
forms of dissent over the past 15 months, and hundreds of members are
usually in custody without charge.

A May 4 strike also has the support of the umbrella protest movement
Kefaya, which began in 2004 in opposition to a new presidential term
for Mubarak or any attempt to install his politician son Gamal as his
successor.

Mubarak's current fifth term expires in 2011 and he has not said what
he intends to do afterwards. His son Gamal, a senior official of the
ruling party, has denied having any presidential ambitions but is
widely seen as Mubarak's obvious heir.

Issandr el-Amrani, an analyst at the International Crisis Group, said
it was natural for the Brotherhood to take a more confrontational
attitude toward the government after a military court jailed 25
members on April 15.

"But I don't really see that this strike in itself, even if the Muslim
Brotherhood supports it, is going to be a decisive moment," Amrani
said. (Editing by Giles Elgood)

-- 
Yoshie
<http://montages.blogspot.com/>