Ahmed Shafiq for president

I know I’ll get lots of flak for this post, which Al-Monitor.com published yesterday under the headline “Vote Shafiq: Warts and All, Mubarak Ally is Better Choice.”  Tens of thousands of Egyptians rallied Tuesday to protest Shafiq’s candidacy.  I’d be more likely to attend that than a pro-Shafiq rally.  There is still a court challenge to his candidacy to be decided.  If he is barred and the third place candidate (Hamdeen Sabahi) put in his place, the arguments made here would need to be adjusted, but I would still see virtue in blocking a Muslim Brotherhood monopoly on power.  Please read on before getting upset:

No one interested in seeing Egypt as a thriving democracy would want to vote for either of the two candidates remaining in the June 16-17 runoff. Freedom and Justice (Muslim Brotherhood) party candidate Mohamed Morsi is an uninspiring second choice, nominated when the original candidate was barred. Former Air Force General Ahmed Shafiq was President Hosni Mubarak’s last prime minister. He accomplished nothing of note in that position and is certainly a remnant of the Mubarak regime overthrown by the January 2010 revolution.

The choice is unappetizing to one-third of the electorate, but the circumstances make Shafiq preferable. The Muslim Brotherhood already controls 48% of the seats in the first post-revolution Egyptian parliament. If Morsi wins the presidency, the Muslim Brotherhood will own Egypt. Its principal rivals in parliament are Salafists, who will try to steer Egypt in their more strictly Islamic direction. Only a president from the more “secular” side of politics — one with at least some appeal to non-Muslims and less religious Muslims — can restore some sense of balance, even if he is an anti-revolutionary figure.