Across the vast swathes of the Arab world, Their Highnesses have either been running helter-skelter or cowering in their gilded palaces, scared out of their wits for the deceptive but rapid shift of sand that has put them all in serious jeopardy. Who could have predicted this seismic change that many have dubbed as the Arab Renaissance with millions nodding in assent? Who could have contemplated, only three months back, that the winds that started blowing from Maghreb down, would shake the decades-old established order in the manner that it did?
Ben Ali, the Tunisian strongman, was sent packing in the middle of January after 22 years in the saddle. Hosni Mubarak followed suit in an Egyptian uprising that saw his unceremonious ouster after three decades in office. In Libya, after a rule spread over four decades, Muammar Gaddafi, now rebranded by the expedient West, is all set to meet the same fate. His use of air force to strafe the people not just indicates his immensely heightened desperation but also heralds the inevitable.
Three tyrants gone, and there are yet more in line. The Tahrir Square marked a victory of people against oppression with few parallels in modern history, and its spillover in neighboring states is a continuation of just that phenomenon. Bahrain, Yemen, Morocco and Saudi Arabia in the latter the least for the moment though are going through various levels of uprising. But one thing is certain: shorn of every veneer of legitimacy and authority, the rulers are so palpably losing the battle for survival. And the imposing edifice of the greater Middle East dictator setup is in mortal danger indeed.
Whether this series of peoples revolutions, the spark of which was lit in the distant north-west Africa, would end up ridding the entire Arab world from its dictators and monarchs remains a point of conjecture. That said, the Tsunami-like velocity with which the fire of freedom has spread is indicative that this is an idea whose time has come.
The Arab world had for so long (around two to four decades) endured the yoke of dictatorships and all the hurt and ignominies that it entailed. But if anything, the regimes of Ben Ali and Mubarak were a whole lot more brutal at their zenith than now, in their twilight. Yet the uprisings were sparked off only now, and with such snowball force. It was only because the peoples yearning for a freer, more egalitarian society was provided the spur by the degeneration in economic conditions.
The trigger of stagflation and food riots finally pressed the Arabs fed up to the point of desperation to throw caution to the winds, pushed with increasing force by the United States and Europes recession counter, deliberate devaluations of currency that pushed up commodity prices (meant in part to check high growth of emerging markets while the developed world continued to suffer). The socio-political and economic conditions thus combined to expose how flammable the apparently calm surface of peoples wrath was.
The Egyptian lower and middle classes had suffered from the economic downturn the most. Once this wave of unrest across Tunisia over unemployment and high prices found resort in the outlet of peaceful protest and realized its power when it unsettled Ben Ali, finally forcing him to flee, there was no stopping the Egyptians in joining the bandwagon.
And once the Tahrir Square was occupied by a million people with such resolve despite stern tests by the police and ruling partys goons, it was supplied and cleaned up by the protesters everyday the end for Mubarak and his coterie was nigh. A revolution was about to sweep them away, one that restores the pride of the Egyptians as a nation like never since Nasser.
This turn of events also means a major setback for the United States. Years of painstaking work of propping up the regimes and the billions of dollars that were invested have all been laid waste. And with it, goes out of the window a most significant loss of influence. So potent is the loss that there are analogies of similar depletion in terms of sway in US own backyard, South America.
To cap the embarrassment, this series of revolutions has also shown up the US policy of lip service to enfranchising the people and clamouring for human rights while actually buttressing the tyrannical one-man rule that is its very anti-thesis for its own advantage not just as twisted but in the ultimate analysis counter-productive.
Will the US continue to search and rely on one man or one-family panacea or change its policy is moot, but one thing is certain: the so carefully constructed bonding between Egypt, Jordan and Israel will soon be in serious disarray. The anger in the Arab street will not allow being cosy with Israel while it pummels the Palestinians.
Another important question: what will the new political model be like? Again, one thing can be said with some measure of certainty: suppressing the will of the people from now on will be impossible.
The writer is Sports and Magazines Editor, Pakistan Today.
