Informative speech

Egyptian Revolution – Egyptian Revolution – The Egyptian Revolution inspired a seriesof uprisings in many Arab countries such as Libya, Syria, Jordan, Bahrain and Yemen. The protests that began on January 25 resulted in ending the 30 year regime of the then President Hosni Mubarak. Protests on such massive scale were not seen in Egypt since 1970s (Parks, 2011).
The protest saw the coming together of millions of people from different religious and socio-economic backgrounds. There were marches, demonstrations and labour strikes organized throughout the country. Tahrir Square became the ground zero of the revolution that lasted for 18 days. It is reported that during the time, over million people gathered at the Square in protest of the Hosni Mubarak’s government (Mohyeldin, 2011).
Even though the uprising was generally a non-violent protest, there were numerous instances of violence and it is reported that around 800 have been and 6000 have been injured. Often there were clashes seen between the protestors and pro-Mubarak demonstrators. This revolution was termed as the victory of the youth who took part in great numbers in the protest. Finally, after 18 days on 11 February 2011 President Hosni Mubarak was ousted after 30 years in power (Parks, 2011).
The revolution achieved what intended to achieve what baffles many is that such a revolution occurred in Egypt. Governments, academics, pundits accept that none had expected a revolution of such scale and magnitude in Egypt. This is best summed by the statement from Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, on the day protests began: “ Our assessment is that the Egyptian government is stable and is looking for ways to respond to the legitimate needs and interests of the Egyptian people.” (Sowers, 2012). This is because Hosni Mubarak’s regime was a good example of durable authoritarianism and its rulers were smart authoritarians. Media was not controlled and relatively free; civic associations, parties and elections were allowed; the government smartly managed the country as compared to other autocratic rules in the region or anywhere else. But then they were ousted in 18 days (Sowers, 2012).
There are 3 explanations that have been put forward to make sense of the situation. First is technology. Technology played a great role in the uprising. For the first time young people participated in the protest in great numbers employed new mediums made available by technology to keep the protest alive. Mediums like Twitter and Facebook were greatly utilized to gather crowds and spread the word about what was happening on the ground to the rest of the world (Parks, 2011). The use of technology not only gathered momentum for the protest internally but also attracted support from the international community (Sowers, 2012).
Second explanation is the inspiration provided by the Tunisian revolution that ousted the regime of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali earlier in the same month the protests began in Egypt. The Tunisian revolution inspired the normal citizens to join the protest unlike earlier protests which was limited to elites and activists. With that support of the masses this protest would also have been managed and suppressed by the government (Sowers, 2012).
Third explanation is the political, economical and legal conditions in the country (Sowers, 2012). The conditions that fuelled the protest are emergency laws, lack freedom of speech, lack of free elections, police brutality, government corruption, unemployment, poverty, soaring commodity prices, etc (Parks, 2011). These factors forced the general population of the country to support the protest and have the autocratic regime to be overthrown.
References
Mohyeldin, A. (2011). Tahrir Square: The Heart of the Egyptian Revolution. Cairo: The American University in Cairo Press.
Parks, C. (2011). Whats Going On In Egypt? [Online] 25 May 2011, Available at: http://www. huffingtonpost. com/2011/01/28/whats-going-on-in-egypt_n_815734. html. Accessed on 26 June 2012.
Sowers, J. (2012). The Journey to Tahrir: Revolution, Protest and Social Change in Egypt. NY: Verso.