Sameh Sa’eed A’bood has been causing a raucous in the Egyptian leftist political history for the last 30 years. Since the early 1980s, A’bood rotated between three Marxist groups, starting with the January 8 Organization – in which he rebelled against the second generation of the communist movement in 1982 – to the People’s Party until 1991, and ending with the Organization of Revolutionary Socialists in the early 1990s, which resulted in a review of the Marxist-Leninist theory.
Sameh Sa’eed A’bood has been causing a raucous in the Egyptian leftist political history for the last 30 years. Since the early 1980s, A’bood rotated between three Marxist groups, starting with the January 8 Organization – in which he rebelled against the second generation of the communist movement in 1982 – to the People’s Party until 1991, and ending with the Organization of Revolutionary Socialists in the early 1990s, which resulted in a review of the Marxist-Leninist theory.
With a genuine inclination for solitude and a ruthless criticism of organizational behavior, and with his early fascination with the Internet, A’bood improved his English and acquainted himself with collective liberal sources. In 1998, he designed the libertarian communism website, but his passion for the Internet was mocked by his comrades who called him ‘the electronic warrior’.
A’bood attended demonstrations demonstrations at Tahrir Square during the revolution. He later joined the “Popular Committee for Defending the Revolution” on October 6, which issued a bulletin under the name “October Voice,” with three issues having been published so far. This committee also played a role in establishing two labor unions, one for workers at Suzuki plant and the other for steel industry workers.
Mr. A’bood, could you tell us about your early political endeavors?
What does the term libertarian communism convey?
It is an interconnected package of ideas, summarized in spreading the cooperative principles in production and services, administrative decentralization, direct and indirect democracy, a guardian state with minimal role, and respect of human rights and fundamental freedoms. These concepts have many things in common with the anarchic-libertarian socialism, although they are somehow different final visions.
When you discourse on utopia, it is important to present a radical criticism of the current situation. It is natural that you realize that the model you are presenting will not be applied tomorrow, but eventually criticizing the situation is a fundamental step followed by contemplating how to change that situation. This is especially true because we are talking about Egypt as a showcase, because how could a country begging for aid achieve social independence from the world? And how could a population this size surviving on seven million farmed acres achieve food self-sufficiency depending only on such a small area? This is only an example on how to turn ideas into meaningless and even something to be laughed at.
Like thousands of Egyptians, you were at Tahrir Square during the revolution. On those days, you met with people who visited your website and then you established the ‘gathering of anarchists’ in Egypt, whose first session was held in August 2011 and the second in November. Can you tell us about that?
The gathering was an attempt to create a form of organization but I found out that I am dealing mostly with individualists who are not convinced of the importance of organization. To me, anarchism means cooperative ownership, which implies that a man should be free but not loose, and for that reason the idea of organization in itself is important because if one goes on the loose, he could not live with others. Man is a socially interactive creature who cannot live alone.
Many people are dealing with the revolution as being a massive festival; they like demonstrations and rallies but once they are asked to do something deeper, not even one could be found. The Tahrir million man rallies have become something like the private ceremonies held to drive out evil spirits (Zar as Egyptians call it) in which very loud music is played in order to reach a coma-like moment when all tension allegedly evaporates. When those people are invited for a different task, such as writing in a newspaper published in an area like the city of 6 October or raise money to fund a small newspaper outside Cairo, they virtually evaporate.
Why do people go out and protest?
Ordinary non-politicized people take to the streets to improve their living conditions and up to this moment the progressive forces have been unable to put forward a realistic program to address these people’s problems. The main issue here is the ideas that bear no fruit for ordinary people, such as the calls to establish a presidential council. Where does this council’s legitimacy come from? And what is the motive behind choosing someone like El Baradei or Sabahi, not anyone else? These are logical and normal questions raised by ordinary people when faced by that kind of revolutionary propaganda.
What, in your opinion, happened to the Egyptian revolution and its slogans?
The revolutions slogans of “bread, freedom and social justice” were literary slogans in tune with the prevailing culture which is based on composition and rhetoric, but what does freedom mean? And is there anyone who is against freedom? Are the Muslim Brotherhood and the salafists against freedom? What kind of freedom we are talking about here? Are they against social justice? Of course not, because to them social justice means almsgiving and zakat, but ordinary people want practical solutions to their daily problems and all those compositional slogans make people cheer and nothing more, but this cheering gets boring after a while.
The revolution is now in state of horrific degradation rather than being stabbed in the back or stolen. At first, I was afraid of passing judgments quickly on that (Ultras) phenomenon, but now I believe that merely trusting the ultras means misunderstanding the revolution as a process and as a social phenomenon in a real and a realistic world not in a virtual world or an entertainment world. Revolutions do not erupt to punish or to take revenge; rather, they erupt to achieve social interests that contradict other interests, and supporting football teams in that manner is like tribal, national, ethnic or religious fanaticism. The non-revolutionary, non-liberal and basically irrational mentality of ultras is identical with the fascist mentality, both leftist and rightist, bearing in mind that ultras are originally from the racist right in Europe.
What could make the revolution break away from this state of degradation?
Putting forward clear social demands associated with specific social groups, such as unemployment or poor distribution of wealth, could put the revolution back on its revolutionary road. Up to this moment, no political forces have spoken about the redistribution of wealth in Egypt, and more specifically about the confiscation of wealth treasured up as a result of corruption under Mubarak, and I am not talking about recovering overseas assets but about the assets of corrupt people inside the country.
Are road closings, sit-ins and strikes not a different kind of revolutionary awareness amongst the public?
(Protestors) closing roads is a random unmethodical rebellion similar to a little child getting angry and smashing things around him and you cannot exactly know what he wants. Up to this moment, all social protests have raised limited demands and once those demands are fulfilled the protest ends. A group of workers may stage a sit-in or go on strike to demand a pay increase, but once the pay increase is given that group freezes and this makes the revolution degrade even further. The revolution could only be exalted if public demands around which broad sections of the population unite are raised. Everybody is talking about the imminent revolution of the hungry without realizing that if the urban poor have no clear vision or specific program, their suppressed anger will turn into a goal instead of destructive waves of rioting.”
