[/caption]
The young football supporter looked like a Napoleonic foot-soldier he strode through the heaving streets of downtown Cairo.
His left eye was covered with a fresh gauze – a result of the ferocious rioting which broke out across Egypt last week – while in his hands he held upright a pole with three flags attached, one above the other. At the top was the Egyptian national ensign. The other two belonged to Cairo’s two biggest football clubs, Zamalek and Al-Ahly; for so long the most implacable of enemies, but which this week found their supporters flung together in mutual opposition to last week’s tragedy in Port Said.
“I have come here to bring back the rights of my brothers,” said the football supporter, a member of the so-called Al-Ahly Ultras whose die-hard fans were among those killed during last Wednesday’s game.
Yesterday there were further ramifications from the tragedy, as MPs in Egypt’s new parliament called for a vote of no confidence in the Interior Minister, Mohamed Ibrahim. It came after accusations that the police had used birdshot pellets to quell the riots which have rocked Egypt over the course of the past few days. The Interior Minister has denied the claim – in spite of testimony from doctors saying that numerous activists were treated for wounds caused by the pellets.
Last week leading members of the People’s Assembly, Egypt’s lower house of parliament, openly said the Military Council and police authorities bore responsibility for the Port Said catastrophe, Egypt’s worst ever football disaster. Serious allegations were made about possible collusion between remnants of former President Hosni Mubarak’s regime and the thugs accused of killing visiting Cairo fans in Port Said.
Ultras who were at the game and spoke to The Majalla said that many of the knife and sword-wielding locals who attacked the Al-Ahly supporters did not look like ordinary fans. Others have raised questions about the highly unusual security lapses before and during the game; how gates at the Port Said stand were mysteriously opened at the end of the match to allow marauding supporters onto the pitch; how a door in the corridor where many Cairo ultras lost their lives was pad-locked during the game, thus preventing thousands of them from escaping once the violence erupted.
It all points to a conspiracy, say MPs and activists, possibly involving the local authorities paying criminals to foment unrest and upset Egypt’s transition to democracy. Such an accusation may sound far-fetched, but one only has to look at past relations between Mubarak’s regime and the criminal underworld to see the scenario is perfectly possible.
The Egyptian Democratic Academy, an NGO which has examined this very issue, uncovered evidence that during the 2010 parliamentary elections, thugs were given cuts of Port Said’s duty free business in exchange for their help in rigging the poll. If there was official collusion in orchestrating last week’s tragedy, it is yet further evidence of how deep the old system runs and how difficult it will be to uproot it. One year on from Egypt’s historic uprising, it seems that in many ways the revolution is just getting started.
