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Things are going from bad to worse in Egypt as reconciliation efforts have given way to use of force and violence in the country. The number of people being killed in clashes is rising every day.
Attacks against armed forces in the Sinai area are becoming regular after the Mursi government’s ouster. The tourism industry is in the doldrums.
I wish the Egyptian army will learn from Pakistan’s lesson and take adequate measures to prevent the situation deteriorating further as in the South Asian country.
The army has been fighting an unfinished battle for the last several years in Pakistan because of rival political parties’ abject failure to control the situation. Thousands of lives have been lost in the ensuing violence in Pakistan. The precarious security situation has hit Pakistan’s economic growth hard. Foreign investment has almost dried up. These are good and valid lessons for the Egyptian military.
Negotiations and dialogue may take time to solve disputes but they are better than resorting to force whose apparent gains will be temporary, if at all. The military must realise that violence begets violence.
Egypt must urgently minimise the army’s role in politics and launch genuine peace efforts and reconciliation between rival parties and groups. Only then, things can start getting better.
Khawaja Umer Farooq,
ofarooq@emailsrvc.com
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