July 18, 2011
Egypt Revamps Cabinet as Protesters Seem to Lose Steam
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
CAIRO -- Egypt's interim military government unveiled a promised cabinet shake-up on Monday aimed at mollifying a 10-day-old protest in Tahrir Square as the protesters themselves appeared for the first time to begin to lose some momentum.
Leaders of the coalition of groups that organized the protest dismissed the cabinet shake-up as insignificant, since full power still lies with the council of military officers that took over with the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak five months ago. It is unlikely that the changes meant much more to the tens of thousands of demonstrators who had filled Tahrir Square since July 8 to demand more sweeping changes from the Egyptian revolution, most notably the criminal prosecution of the country's former leaders.
But perhaps because of an accumulation of such concessions or the unstinting heat of the desert sun, the demonstrators had dissipated enough by Monday afternoon that the square seemed like empty pavement surrounding a small tent city. Still, it was not open to traffic.
Fourteen of the 27 cabinet members were replaced in the shake-up, including the ministers of finance and foreign affairs. But the government left in place the ministers of justice and the interior, whom many Egyptians have blamed for what they say is tardiness in the prosecution of former government leaders and the restoration of security.
After the reorganization was announced, the interim prime minister, Essam Sharaf -- picked by the revolutionaries a few months ago, though they are now demanding his resignation for failing to move faster or push back against his military bosses -- was taken to the hospital for tests "with fatigue after a tough day," according to the state news agency. Mr. Sharaf, 59, kept his job. Shortly after 1 a.m. Tuesday, state television reported his health was stable.
The council named Hazem el Beblawy, an economist who previously worked for the United Nations and the Export Development Bank of Egypt, as both finance minister and a new deputy prime minister. Although protest leaders recommended him for the post because he had few ties to the old regime, he was not expected to change Egypt's current fiscal course. He succeeded Samir Radwan, a liberal appointed at the end of Mr. Mubarak's rule who left complaining that he was caught between unreasonable demands from the public and his military bosses for both more spending and less debt.
As foreign minister, the government named Mohamed Kamel Amr, a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia and a former Egyptian representative to the World Bank. Protest leaders complained that like his predecessor, Mohamed el Orabi, who served less than a month, Mr. Amr had been too involved in the Mubarak government to make a break with the past.
The government initially indicated that it intended to name Abdel Fattah el Banna as the new minister of antiquities. But in a demonstration of a continued eagerness to appease the streets, the protests of archaeologists convinced the government to withdraw his name. The specific objections to Mr. Banna were unclear.
The previous minister of antiquities, Zahi Hawass, was hounded by protesters in part because of allegations that he exploited his position for personal profit, making deals with private companies that capitalized on his authority over Egyptian artifacts.
Since the current Tahrir Square protest began, the military-led government has also announced the termination of more than 600 senior police officers accused of violence against demonstrators during the revolution. It pledged to draft a binding "declaration of basic rights" to protect civil liberties under the new Constitution, although that document is also expected to spell out the military's own powers as well. And on Monday a statement on the military's Facebook page appeared to narrow the range of cases in which civilians would be sent to military trials -- a major complaint of the protesters. Suspects would undergo military trials only in cases involving knives or guns or the assault of security officials, a pullback from broader statements applying such prosecutions to the violation of curfews or to vague categories like thuggery.
Heba Afify contributed reporting.