Comprensorio Casilino

davide — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 09:40:56 +0000

COMPRENSORIO CASILINO #1 from 101 Film on Vimeo.

Il VI Municipio ha la più alta densità abitativa di Roma, pari a 18k abitanti / km2, a fronte di una media romana di 2,2k/km2. Il Piano Particolareggiato Comprensorio Casilino prevede la costruzione di 3000 ulteriori abitazioni laddove sopravvive l’unico polmone verde della periferia orientale romana, un’area originariamente destinata alla costruzione dello SDO. Guidati dai volontari dell’Osservatorio Casilino, gli abitanti del Municipio VI si oppongono al progetto di cementificazione delle aree verdi.
di Davide Morandini e Matteo Keffer

Merqana (2012)

davide — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 15:14:19 +0000

The experience of merqana binds together tens of millions of people in the Horn of Africa and beyond. Similar to that of the legendary Lotus, merqana is a profound state of high, deriving form the chewing of a leafy amphetamine called qat. Set in the ancient, walled city of Harar and its surroundings, the film takes you to an epic journey through the social life of one of the world’s most popular drugs, threading upon green carpets of leaves, and dancing at the rhythm of centuries-old mystic rituals.

MERQANA OFFICIAL TRAILER [ENG] from 101 Film on Vimeo.

Those who were given the honey-sweet lotus to eat, no longer wished to bring back word to us or sail for home. They wanted to stay, eating the lotus, forgetting all thoughts of return – Homer, Odyssey

A qat worker in Awoday.

‘Merqana’ explores the social universe of qat, cutting through an only apparently ordinary day in the plant’s commodity chain. It follows the fascinating work of Ramadan, a newly married farmer; Jarso, a successful merchant; and Amir, a young religious leader with a passion for long chewing sessions and traditional Sufi chants. The film unfolds the ways this little-known plant has become extremely popular among the people of Harar, becoming the main source of income for poor farmers and wealthy businessmen

Qat was chewed for centuries in the Horn of Africa and beyond, but has only recently become a major cash crop for farmers in Ethiopia, and a popular commodity in many countries around the world. As a consequence, qat is a powerful means of economic and cultural exchange between East African states, as well as with the diasporic communities living in Europe and in the US. ‘Merqana’ was entirely shot in and around the walled city of Harar, Ethiopia. Founded around the 7th century by Muslim migrants from the Arabian Peninsula, Harar was the main city on the trade route linking Yemen to the heart of Africa. Isolated from the rest of the region soon after the realisation of the Djibuto-Ethiopian railway, Harar and the nearby night market of Awoday remain the cultural, economic and political capitals of qat, being the plant cultivated mostly in their surroundings

A qat field near Harar.

A film by
David Chierchini
Matteo Keffer
Davide Morandini

Produced by
101 Film
Sharafuddin Mancioli

In collaboration with
Fourisync
zerosix productions

Bulaq (2011)

davide — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 13:07:59 +0000

On 25th January thousands of Egyptians gathered in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, sparking what we call now the Egyptian Revolution. Only a few hundred meters far from the world-famous square, the people from popular neighbourhood Bulaq joined protesters, finding in demonstrations something more than a glimmer of hope. Through their voices, ‘Bulaq’ portrays their collective struggle against eviction and social marginalisation, whose destiny seems to be strictly intertwined with the hesitant fortunes of the Egyptian spring.

Some remarks

The idea of Bulaq materialized in 2009, when the two directors Davide Morandini and Fabio Lucchini travelled to Egypt to carry out Research on political organisation in Cairo’s informal neighbourhoods. They both came back to the city after the so-called revolution and started to develop the subject of their documentary film while working as researchers and journalists. Matteo Keffer, a young Swiss-Italian Filmmaker and friend, joined them in June to shoot their first film.

Moved by insatiable curiosity and an extreme commitment to social justice, the three make up a young team bringing together different skills and experiences, ranging from filmmaking, investigative journalism and social research. Therefore, Bulaq attempts to investigate into one of the many social movements that supported the demonstrations leading to Mubarak’s dismissal. By portraying the reality of a historical, popular neighbourhood besieged by investment companies and property speculation, Bulaq aims to shed light one of the decades-long social struggles hiding behind the fulminating 18 days of the Egyptian Revolution.

The principal photography was carried out during 8 difficult days, juggling between the strict surveillance of the security forces monitoring their movements and the people’s distrust of cameras and journalists, fomented by an unprecedented xenophobic campaign mounted by national media throughout the uprisings. This propaganda wanted, and still wants every foreign journalist or filmmaker to be looked at as a potential threat to national integrity during this very erratic, historical moment.

Synopsis

This documentary attempts a portrait of a contested space in central Cairo. Bulaq Abu el-Ela is a neighbourhood laying just few hundred meters from the world-famous Tahrir Square, symbol of the recent Egyptian Revolution. Since 1979, people in Bulaq live in loom of eviction: Egyptian security forces demolish houses and transfer inhabitants to one of the new towns built at the outskirt of the city, in the middle of the desert, as the old regime had planned to carry out massive plans of so-called urban development known as Cairo 2050. According to this plans, popular neighbourhoods in Downton Cairo like Bulaq would be demolished to leave room for the construction of touristic facilities and 5-star hotels.

Since last February though, the revolution gave inhabitants of Bulaq a hope that their housing rights be respected, and that the new democratic government would give up with demolitions. In fact, Bulaq is close to Tahrir Square, and the neighbourhood was directly involved in the popular uprisings that brought to Mubarak’s dismissal. Hundreds of demonstrators stormed into the neighbourhood, seeking to hide from security forces brutalizing protesters. Women from Bulaq responded offering food and opening the doors of their endangered houses to young revolutionaries. Therefore, this documentary also portraits the ways in which the fortune of this popular neighbourhood intertwine with those of the so-called revolution, telling of some of the intimate aspirations that still bring people to take the street and protest for the right to live a life worth living.

Bulaq was awarded with the first Prize at the first edition of the Festival of short reportages “Pillole di Attualità” in Rome, in September 2011. Here is a collection of snapshots and backstage pics, enjoy it!

http://www.facebook.com/bulaq

Contacts
@davidemorandini
bulaq2011@gmail.com
(+39) 348 30 58 488
(+44) 785 22 85 317

Country: UK | Italy | Egypt
Language: Arabic (English Subtitles)
Filming Locations: Cairo, Egypt

Aspect ratio 16:9 HD (letterbox)
Runtime: 25 min (original version)
Sound Mix: Stereo
Color: Color (HD)

A view of Bulaq, Downtown Cairo.

Our neglected oracle, the legendary Sayed Khamis

Matteo on a rooftop

An antenna stands between the Ministry of Telecommunications and that of Foreign Affairs, looming and silent characters of the documentary

Fabio chats with Sayed, one of the stars featuring in the film

Meditative Sayed walking through the alleys of Bulaq

Final destination: a hostile environment

The Mulid of Hussein

davide — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 08:31:21 +0000

showman

the whirl around

turbanity

The Nile: Empowering the African Connection

davide — Tue, 17 May 2011 15:09:43 +0000

Negotiations over the construction of the biggest African hydroelectric plant appeared to cool down after Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi agreed on postponing the signature of a Nile Water agreement, due on the May 14. According to Zenawi, this will allow Egypt to stabilize the country’s current political crisis and take up a more active role in the negotiations.

The move followed the visit of a 48-member Egyptian delegation to Addis Ababa aiming to dissuade Zenawi from the sudden “arms race.” When Zenawi announced the construction of the Millennium Dam in mid-March, Egypt was dealing with the culmination of its popular uprising, which had ousted President Hosni Mubarak and his ruling regime. After decades of hostile relations with Mubarak, upstream countries finally saw an opportunity to uphold their demands and ask for what they said was their rightful water share to be recognized.

Most of the controversy lies in the fact that even as Ethiopia’s tributaries contribute some 85 percent to the Nile flow at Aswan, Egypt still enjoys the lion’s share of almost 90 percent of the river’s water, approximately 55.5 billion cubic meters yearly. The share of Nile basin water between riparian countries is still regulated by colonial agreements dating back to 1929 and 1959, respectively.

In a bid to agree on a fairer distribution of Nile water share, upstream countries Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya and Burundi recently signed an understanding that would lead to the re-discussion of the treaties’ terms.

But Egypt heavily depends on the Nile. As intensive exploitation of Nile water allowed the Egyptian population to grow up to more than 80 million people, water is going scarcer in Egypt, feeding fears that any dam or plant built on the Nile would close the tap to Egyptian agriculture and domestic water use. While it is undeniable that all riparian countries should enjoy equitable rights to water use, Egypt’s high dependence from Nile water seems to be locking negotiations into a loophole.

Dams and tanks

Zenawi provided the Italian company Salini Costruttori with a no-bid contract for the construction of the Millennium Dam. The company holds long-standing relations with Zenawi’s government, and managed the construction of several other plants in Ethiopia, including the catastrophic and the more than controversial Gibe 3.

“Gibe 3 is the most destructive dam under construction in Africa. The project will condemn half a million of the region’s most vulnerable people to hunger and conflict,” said director of International Rivers’ Africa Program Terri Hathaway.

Well-positioned sources told Bikya Masr that President Zenawi might have came out into the open with the Millennium Dam project without carrying out necessary environmental and feasibility studies. This was aimed not to alert downstream countries of his plans and avoid their encroachment.

Apart from this, a main problem lies in the fact that Zenawi lacks the financial capability to uphold this unprecedented project. Former Egyptian President Mubarak repeatedly tried to divert financial aid to upstream countries and hinder their development projects. Nonetheless, after Mubarak’s fall Ethiopia is still unable to find proper funding.

In answer to this, Zenawi launched a nation-wide campaign to support the Millennium Dam, and called for Ethiopians to buy Millennium bonds from the Ethiopian Central Bank in order to fund the dam’s construction. Some regard Zenawi as a benevolent leader, willing to free the country from the bonds of poverty and international dependance. Others doubt the earnestness of his declarations, suspecting that behind this popular campaign hides the attempt to keep the people from thinking of their dire existence and prevent popular uprising.

Sources told Bikya Masr “if someone wants [to] start a nationalist campaign, it is better to see people buying bonds for a dam than for tanks.”

But according to PhD candidate Getachew Begashaw, “the government of Meles Zenawi has a bond rating of CCC-, which is less than what is called Junk Bond (BBB- rating by Standard & Poor’s). How such a government with poor rating can be a reliable guarantor of corporate bond is open to question.

“Zenawi is cunningly using the project to perpetually milk the hard earned money of the Ethiopian people, including those in the Diaspora,” added Begashaw.

By raising international tension and by coercing people to pay money for the construction of a much controversial and unpredictable project, Zenawi might easily fill the gap between dams and tanks.

Cooperation and Diversification

The mounting tension between Egypt and Ethiopia finds its root in Egypt’s dependence on the Nile. Water for agricultural, industrial and domestic use and the country’s energetic autonomy depend greatly on the river’s flow. Diversifying water resources in Egypt can be a first step towards relaxing geopolitical tension related to the river’s water and providing the nation with a more reliable water system.

“The immediate answer is to turn towards non-conventional sources such as water recycling, reuse of drainage water, treated industrial and sewage effluents, rainfall harvesting and desalination,” writes Fouad el-Shibini from the National Water Research Centre of Ismailiya.

Desalination plants have been developed on the Saudi Arabian shore or the Red Sea and might be a suitable solution for industrial use also in Egypt. Development plan in the Qattara depression might open new highways to the exploitation of underground and sea waters.

Increasing diversity means decreasing dependance. A stronger Egypt could be leading a regional renewal, encouraging developmental projects in upstream countries and sharing with them the fruit of their investments. In the last 40 years, Egypt has been at the receiving end of a profitable developmental corridor that drove into its treasury millions in aid investments from the International Financial Institutions (IFI) and the U.S. Egypt’s new role in a re-energized African connection can be greatly profitable for up and downstream countries alike.

Decreasing dependence would also mean decreasing Egypt’s interest in hindering other nation’s development, for example exercising its veto power in the Nile Basin Initiative (NBI). Fear of Egyptian and Sudanese encroachment in Ethiopia’s plans legitimized Zenawi’s acting in the shadow, coming up with a project that lacks of funding, risks provoking long-lasting geopolitical repercussions, and of endangering the environment and wasting the citizen’s savings. A stronger Egypt will benefit the whole region and cannot be built on the others’ weaknesses.

Al Cairo si riaccende lo scontro fra cristiani e musulmani

davide — Sun, 08 May 2011 10:13:15 +0000

È improvvisamente riesploso lo scontro fra cristiani copti e musulmani ieri notte nel quartiere cristiano del Cairo. Durante una sparatoria fra un gruppo di fondamentalisti islamici e alcuni residenti del famoso quartiere a maggioranza copta, almeno dodici persone sono rimaste uccise e 150 ferite. Secondo quanto denunciato dai residenti del quartiere, alle radici dell’attacco ci sarebbero voci che vogliono una donna copta tenuta in ostaggio in chiesa perché pronta a convertirsi all’Islam. I preti della chiesa di Santa Mena avrebbero così pensato di impedirle la conversione, impedendole di venire allo scoperto.

Si è riacceso così un conflitto che sembrava sopito, dopo che quasi due mesi fa dieci cristiani erano rimasti uccisi in scontri settari nel quartiere popolare del Moqattam, a est del Cairo. Quella notte, un gruppo di fondamentalisti aveva attaccato una chiesa, aprendo fuoco indiscriminatamente sui passanti indifesi. Ma questa volta non tutti sono convinti della matrice islamica dell’attacco. Tamer, uno dei residenti del quartiere, giura che è stata tutta opera di alcuni teppisti, volenterosi di sollevare il caos per le strade del quartiere. Questi cosiddetti ‘teppisti’ (baltageya) ricoprono un ruolo famoso in Egitto: sono quei gruppi di malintenzionati al soldo dei potenti, il cui mestiere è provocare il caos su commissione e che arrivarono all’apice della loro (im)popolarità quando comparirono sulle prime pagine dei quotidiani internazionali dopo aver attaccato i manifestanti di Piazza Tahrir a dorso di cavallo e cammello, il 29 gennaio scorso.

Ma non è la prima volta che scontri di matrice religiosa vengono confusi con faide di altra natura. Molti in Egitto pensano che le esplosioni che distrussero le due Chiese di Alessandria prima delle celebrazioni per il Capodanno copto siano state opera dei servizi segreti volti ad aumentare la tensione nel paese, più che opera di un isolato gruppo di fondamentalisti islamici con pochissimo seguito in tutto l’Egitto.

La dissoluzione dell’ Amn ed-Dawla (l’odiato corpo dei servizi segreti) e la recente incarcerazione e condanna a 12 anni per l’ex ministro degli Interni Habib el-Adly non hanno fatto che dare più adito a questi sospetti. Già le manifestazioni (annunciate come anti-cristiane) che hanno bloccato per quasi una settimana la città meridionale di Qena non hanno tardato a rivelare la loro matrice non-religiosa. Lì i manifestanti hanno spontaneamente allentato la tensione quando un gruppo di fondamentalisti ha provato a rivendicare la paternità delle manifestazioni, sviando l’attenzione dai veri motivi proteste e attribuendo loro una matrice religiosa fuori contesto. Alla base di quelle manifestazioni, infatti, c’era la volontà di voltare pagina e lasciarsi alle spalle la corruzione e l’emarginazione dell’Alto Egitto voluta dall’Ancien Regime della cricca mubaracchiana, ancora rappresentata dal neo-nominato governatore Mikhail malvoluto da tutti gli abitanti della città, sia Musulmani che Cristiani. In un paese che ancora deve recuperare dalla grave crisi economica e sociale in cui è piombato dopo la storica rivoluzione del 25 Gennaio, al nuovo governo spetta l’arduo compito di stare al passo con le aspettative di un popolo che ha capito di essere in grado di poter cacciare un dittatore.

Più che odio religioso, sembra che alla base di questi scontri ci sia la quasi totale mancanza di forze di sicurezza a garantire l’ordine pubblico per le strade del Cairo post-rivoluzionario. Più di tre mesi fa ormai, la polizia si è vista obbligata a passare il testimone all’esercito, il giorno in cui le forze dell’ordine sono state surclassate e pubblicamente umiliate dalla folla di manifestanti accorsa a Piazza Tahrir per chiedere all’ex Presidente Hosni Mubarak di abbandonare il paese. Mentre in questi giorni la polizia fa solo gradualmente ritorno ai suoi presidi, il ruolo dell’esercito rimane limitato alla protezione di obiettivi sensibili, lasciando l’amministrazione dell’ordine pubblico alle ronde volontarie dei residenti di quartiere e al buon cuore della popolazione civile. È anche questa più o meno voluta mancanza di controllo a lasciare che le intenzioni molto poco religiose di un manipolo di estremisti si mischino a cose molto ma molto più grandi di loro.

il sito del Sole

Alexandria Fish Market

davide — Sat, 07 May 2011 08:35:55 +0000

in & out

over there

cyan steps

Celebrating May-Day with Cairo’s (other) workers

davide — Mon, 02 May 2011 14:50:25 +0000

The first May day in post-revolutionary Egypt saw hundreds of thousands of people gather in Tahrir Square. The crowd asked for the new government to guarantee reforms that would provide workers with basic rights.

But Magdir, a 45 years-old worker for a Cairo construction company, did not rally in Tahrir. He spent his Mayday working with his colleagues, re-painting the facade of a building only few blocks away from the world-famous Square where demonstrators had gathered.

“There is nothing to do there,” Magdir told Bikya Masr while holding a blue rope in his right hand spattered with yellow paint. Magdir raises his head, peering at the paint basket hanging at the opposite end of the rope. There, his workmates Ahmed and Abdallah sink their rollers and attentively paint the facade of a nineteenth century downtown building.

Ahmed and Abdallah stand on the same wooden beam, leaned on by two motorbike tires, each of them hanging from a rope they previously fixed on the top of the building. The two swing together at roughly 20 meters from the floor, giving a brush to the facade every time their fluctuation takes them close enough to the building.

“Thank God we work six days a week,” continued Magdir, “and on Friday I stay at home, play Playstation or football with friends.”

Magdir used to be a migrant worker. He worked as a cook in Jordan, as a waiter in Syria and as a builder in Saudi Arabia. When he found wife in Egypt and planned to settle down, this job was the best he managed to get.

However, he regards this as a lucky catch somehow, as his and his colleagues’ daily salary range between LE60-80 daily ($10-15), exceeding the monthly LE400 ($68) set by Egypt’s current legislation as minimum wage.

This is another reason why they might not have joined Tahrir’s protesters. There, demonstrators called for the government to immediately raise minimum wages up to LE1,200 ($200).

Until October 2010, minimum wage in Egypt was set at LE35 monthly ($6). It was then raised just over the World Bank’s Moderate Poverty Threshold ($2 daily) following unprecedented protests.

But many look on with nostalgia at the earlier stand, as employees would openly negotiate salaries with their own employer. As the minimum wage was set at a higher rate, many ended up with earnings lower then they would expect before the reform.

Instead, Magdir’s concerns depend on another topic. “His father died two years ago,” says him pointing at his young apprentice Amr, “he fell from the beam. Gone.” Lacking alternatives, Amr took his father’s place in the company and is now learning from his colleagues how to swing on the beam.

“It takes an iron heart to get up there,” intervenes Mohammed, one of the company’s veteran. Mohammed has been going up on the beam for more than thirty years. He now enjoys the petty tasks reserved to an experienced assistant like him.

He does not know how and when, but Magdir considers a trade union the only way out from their unlucky position.

He and his colleagues think many steps forward have been done towards the creation of a safer working environment in the last years. Nonetheless, as a consequence of the complete lack of public subsidies and the dangerous working conditions, their job is often not worth doing.

Independent trade unions outside the management of state-led Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF) were formally banned under former President Hosni Mubarak. After the February 11 collapse of the regime, the ETUF’s 54 year-long monopoly was interrupted by the creation of a range of new associations, covering all sorts of categories including those previously discriminated by the ETUF like farmers and fishermen.

Lack of coordination and know-how are not the only obstacles between workers like Magdir and trade unions.

The Cairo Land Center for Human Rights (LCHR) recently warned of an ongoing genocide in the Egyptian village of Musa, as remnants of the former regime deprived inhabitants of current water and food supplies, as they discovered farmers were planning to institute a trade union to cover their interests.
As the battle rages on on Tahrir’s international stage, and newly-formed trade unions endorse interests of industrial workers (see those in Shebeen al-Kom or Mahalla), those like Magdir have a much longer and tougher battle ahead of them.

Abdallah and Ahmed slowly reach the base of the building and finally hop off the beam. Abdallah says he does not fear his job, but hopes he will soon have enough money to give it up. He wants to buy a Toyota and work as a microbus driver.

Why the revolution should leave Midan Tahrir, for a moment at least

davide — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:40:23 +0000

There is not much to do in Midan Tahrir for the revolution, now less than ever. This is what most of the Egyptian opposition forces seem to realise in these dramatic days of chaotic protests. The Midan falling back into some kind of surreal ‘normality’ is certainly not the result of the Army’s violent, ruthless comeback, neither of a loss of revolutionary fervour by the forces of the opposition. It is a sign, hopefully of change.

The father of a martyr shot dead in the Square holds up a piece of paper stained with the blood of his dead son

On Thursday morning, soldiers and volunteers in downtown Cairo were planting flowers in the Midan and painting walls and pavements in white and black, as if covering the written signs of a country in uprising would make people forget about how much they have achieved so far.

Last Saturday, two desperate parents wandered crying around Tahrir for hours, showing people a bloodstained piece of carton carrying the dimm el-shaheed, the blood of their martyred son killed in the Midan on Friday, while the Army was reportedly shooting in the air in order to frighten what they still want people to think is only a small group of violent dawdlers. Will I ever forget those crying faces?

Sharif, one of the shebab temporarily opposing protests in Tahrir, says there are three different kinds of people:

There are people who work for the revolution, people who work against the revolution, and people who sit at home, watching television and believing whatever the news says.
One of the Army’s strongest points lies in the power of a dialectic, enforced by media still subjugated by a corrupted political system, aiming to divide those in favour of the revolution, keeping them at home and turning them into sceptical observers from afar. They say the people in Tahrir are baltageya, professional thugs whose job is to throw the country into anarchy and chaos, occasionally selling hashish during breaks.

The baltageya is indeed an actor on stage, but is a double-edged one. Even two inveterate supporters of the baltageya like Hosni Mubarak and former Interior Minister Habib el-Adly committed their last, fatal mistake by ordering the opening of state prisons on 28 January. The sight of “pro-Mubarak” supporters riding camels and storming into the crowd to beat peaceful demonstrators made protesters squeeze up.

Even those who already made up their minds and wanted to allow Mubarak to stay until September elections, suddenly found themselves shouting for his ouster. Almost three months after those events, the baltageya‘s double-edge is still a highly destabilising factor in the country, fully exploited by those reactionary forces willing to thwart the country’s path towards political normalisation.

But this is not enough. As a small number of Army officials joined demonstrators and refused to take off their uniforms last Friday, many protesters smelled a rat. This intrusion disclosed a glaring sign of division within the Army, but at the same time it legitimised the intervention of security forces.

After seeing them shooting in the crowd and clearing out the Midan, many protesters still fool themselves into thinking that the Army is the people’s only guardian, and that those who cleared out Tahrir were mercenaries paid by Mubarak’s personal friend and business Ibrahim Kamel. Even in this case, where was the Army when the people needed protection? Egyptians have to realise that the time – if there was ever one – when the people and the Army were iid wahda (one hand) are now definitely over, and handing over power to a civil presidential council is the only solution for the time being.

Here we come to the point. The recent escalation of violence is a sign that the Army’s divide and rule agenda is being successfully put forward. This urged the opposition to wisely call for a suspension of demonstrations, and for the cancellation of Friday’s milioneya, the march of the million calling for the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) to step down. This does not mean that revolutionary forces are satisfied with the Mubaraks’ or Kamel’s – fake – prosecution. “Our revolution is not against Mubarak,” one of the activists involved in the movement for the ‘Protection of the Revolution’ reminded me. “Our protests aim at a reversal of the 1952 coup d’état and the institution of a civil Presidential council”. Indeed, Field Marshall Mohammed Hussein Tantawi is a military man, like Mohammed Naguib, Gamal Abdel Naser, Anwar Sadat and Hosni Mubarak before him.

When I asked an Egyptian friend for a definition of the baltageya, he told me “a baltagy is either someone who pushes you to do something you do not want to do or someone who prevents you from doing what you want to do.” Suspending protests this Friday means avoiding that open (and suicidal) confrontation the Army has been looking for since they mingled with those violent enemies of the people’s rightful demands.

The revolution has been played out in many other fields, but Midan Tahrir still remains the battleground for the protesters’ main political demands. Celebrating a new Friday of protests with an empty Midan Tahrir amounts to an important step towards the realisation of the revolutionary agenda, and shows that the revolution is gaining ground on, and understanding of, an increasingly chaotic panorama, remaining loyal at the same time to its peaceful character and refusing to bow heads in front of the SCAF’s cosmetic adjustments.

read more from the Frontline Club London

Golden Island

davide — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 08:51:32 +0000