Egyptians living abroad want their right to vote!

The following text was written for the petition I lauched for asking to the High Council of Armed Forces of Egypt to reconsider their decision of deniying the right to vote for Egyptians living abroad. If you are an Egyptian living abroad and feel concerned about the denial of your rights, feel free to sign the petition here and share it with your contacts.

Indeed, The Egypt’s Military Council, in charge of leading the country since February 11th 2011 after putting an end to 30 years of Mubarak’s autocratic regime, decided to deprive Egyptians abroad from their right to vote. The Egyptian diaspora represents 4 million people living in 139 countries. Their rights as citizens were denied to them for the very arbitrary reason of the possibility of their votes being “sold” to non-Egyptian interests. The Egyptian diaspora is fully part of Egypt, and the Egyptians living abroad are therefore asking for their rights as citizen to be respected.

To: the High Council of the Armed Forces of Egypt

We, Egyptians living abroad, consider ourselves as fully Egyptians.Our reasons for migration are very different from one person to another, and very few of us consider living outside of Egypt as a deep aspiration. For many of us, it was merely a necessity: some had to migrate to look for a better living, sometimes being simply denied the opportunity to live decently in Egypt under the 30 years of autocratic regime, some others were forced to look for a safe place for they were haunted for their subversive opinions, some even work from abroad for the improvement of their country of origin (in International Organizations for example), some were also born abroad from Egyptian parents. What we have all in common is our love for Egypt and our concern for the future of our country.

We consider the denial made to our right to vote, based on the enventuality that our votes might well be “bought” by foreign interests is not only discriminatory towards us, but is also against the principles of the New Egypt we all wish to see blossoming. Besides being based on an unjustified and subjective preconception, it also sends a strong message to Egyptians living abroad: “You are unworthy to Egypt”.

We are aware of the technical difficulty to coordinate polling stations in 139 countries, but we don’t consider it as a reason for the denial of our rights as citizens. Not only many countries offer to their diaspora the possibility to vote, thus proving it is possible, but also this would mean that a minor technical constraint is stronger than our noble principles of freedom, democracy and unity.

We urge the Marshal Mohammed Tantawi, Chairman of the High Council of Armed Forces of Egypt to consider our determination to participate to the political life of our country and to give us our right to vote, regardless of our country of residence.

Thank you for your time and attention to this matter.

Muslims in Europe: more than 4 decades of democratic experience

Europe has always seen itself as the continent of origin of democracy. Because of the historical context in France at the time of the Revolution, democracy in Europe is deeply secular and rejects any intersection of religion and politics. So when Muslims in Europe bagan to participate on the political scene, there is only one concern that was expressed everywhere by European non-muslims: is democracy and Islam two compatible set of values? Can it be that one person claims at the same time being muslim (not only in the very private sphere but also publically) and democratic? Is the acceptance of Islam in the public sphere a danger for democracy?

The current events in the Arab World is a very clear proof that Islam and democracy are compatible. But there is also another proof: in analyzing the History of the last half century of Muslim migration waves in Europe, it is extremely clear that Muslims in Europe have always been dealing with the rest of the society through democratic means.

How have been Muslims in Europe acting democratic during the last half century?

During the second half of the twentieth century, Europe faced a major social change when, after decolonization, migrants arrived from Africa and Asia in waves. To each european country its specific history, hence its specific migrations. If we try to stay limited to muslim migrants (for the purpose of this article): Indian-Pakistanese in UK, Maghrebi-West and Central African in France, Moroccan in Spain, Tunisian in Italy, Turkish in Germany, etc. We can also add Bosniac and Albanese/Kosova migrants at the end of the twentieth century; for example Switzerland alone hosts third of the entire Kosova diaspora. Of course those are only basic trends and do not account of the full migration profiles. Each european country had its own policy in dealing with migration that evolved through decades, for better or worse. One has to distinguish here between two “extreme” cases:

• the British case : the State interfers as less as possible in internal affairs of the community, providing them even the option to solve certain type of conflicts in front of a Muslim Arbitration Tribunal (MAT)
• the French case : the State wishes to merge as much as possible all communities into one unique entity, the Republic, bound by common values, summerized as follows: “Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité“

Between these two extreme cases a significant number of variations are found. Anyway. What is interesting is that these migrants, that started more or less arriving in Europe in the 60′s, didn’t provide to the economy only labour vs. money: they established in Europe, got married (not necessarely with somebody from the same cultural background), raised children. If not the parents, the children, at least, acquired the citizenship of the “host” country, what enabled them, when reaching 18+, to vote and be actively part of the civil life. Having been in european schools, being introduced to european economy as workers and speaking in general the language of the host country (english, french, german, etc) much better than the language of the country of origin, it seemed to them very natural that they will build their life and career in Europe as fully Europeans.

What is interesting here is that muslim migrants children born in Europe remained quite attached to their roots and origins, although being fully conscious of being european. Many of them also kept a tight bound with Islam. Unlike the parents who felt they were whatsoever “from abroad”, their sons and daughters called for their rights to be guaranted. As the various constitutions were giving the same rights to all citizens, regardless of their religion, they asked for equality and for being given the opportunity to evolve through the civil life in a way that wouldn’t hurt their convictions. This covers topics as different as the end of discrimination in the labour market, authaurizations for building enough mosques for welcoming all the faithfuls, the availability at school restaurants of hallah meat for the children (basic “day-to-day life” rights) but also political rights through representation in classical political parties, visibility in the medias or recognition of colonial crimes (more or less: the right to be recognized as part of the identity of the country). On the other hand, the civil society/established powers asked to this European-Muslim generation to insert themselves as much as possible into the existing structures and follow as much as possible the existing laws, like for example accepting that the secularity of laws requires from them concessions on the dress code when working in public sector or sticking to the idea of the prevalence of the national laws on the Sharia. These two flows of demands meet in a point where they balance. The exact location of this balance point depends first on the integration policy the state applies (like the british case and french case seen above), but also of the socio-economical profile of the communities (number, cultral background, average education level, distribution over cities, etc). Generally the European-Muslims are represented by two main trends: those who believe only in assimilating totally in the “host” society by erasing all what makes them different and those who, although they want to be fully recognized as Europeans, do not want to be forced to let aside their religious and cultural specificity.

It is to notice that whatever the demands are, the European-Muslims, as citizens born in democratic countries and raised in the idea that their parents migrated to offer them an auspicious background for a better living, are claiming and asking for recognition of their rights following democratic procedures. They generally take form of:

• peaceful protests (for example La Marche des Beurs in France in 1983)
• intensive involvment in associations not specifically islamic (like for example SOS Racisme, Les Indigènes de la République, workers syndicates in UK, Turkish secular associations in Germany, political parties, etc)
• foundation of islamic institutions initiated by the community itself (Muslim Council of Britain, Islamic Council of Netherlands, etc) or initiated by the government (Conseil Français du Culte Musulman)
• active participation into the democratic debate through mediatic coverage (like the islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan or the antiracism activist Malek Boutih)
• petitions (against dismissal of employees for religious reasons)
• trials (asking for a space for prayer on the work place, recognition of a discrimination case, etc)
• boycott campaigns (brands not specifying clearly the use of prohibited food in some products)
• assiociative mutual help (when politics do not help): actions for homeless, youth educators to prevent violence, social integration through sports and art, etc
• providing private services in agreement with muslim values, with the agreement of european governments: hallal food providers, islamic banking, private schools, etc

There is also a unique but interesting case of a muslim political party in UK, Hizb et-Tahrir, clearly extremist in its points of view but in the same time “fairly” participating on the political scene by debating (the same way a right-winged political party is considered to be democratic because it accepts the “rules of the game”). All these democratic procedures have in common to be non-violent. Of course, there is also some rare cases of violent acts, although quite limited compared to the number of peaceful initiatives. These acts although restricted in number could be seen as the beginning of a breakdown between the European-Muslims  and the rest of the society: assassination of Theo Van Gogh in Netherlands, the Khaled Kelkal’s terrorist acts, London and Madrid bombings, french suburban areas unrest events of 2005, violent treats after the Muhammad (SWS) cartoons controversy. These violent acts are most of the time tightly entangled with the international context such as the Algerian civil war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Gulf Wars or of course the 11th of September. One has to not confuse between the violent political acts and the criminality and urban violence witnessed in poor stratum of the society and working-poor class, for the latter are not political movements; they might express loudly the despair of a community banned by the rest of the society and living difficult conditions (living in poor suburban areas, being jobless).

But whatsoever, besides those very rare examples, the European-Muslims mostly follow existing laws or fight within the democratic frame for their rights. Indeed, they are extremely present in the front line, and, it has to be pointed, if they are present through the activities listed above, they never pressured through powerful lobbies.

As a consequence, the long-debated question of the compatibility of democracy with Islam is quite non-revelant: European-Muslims have been, for now more than 4 decades, interacting with the European civil, economical, juridical and political society only through democratical means. All the rights debated, obtained or rejected have been issued by a democratic process.

Democratic European Muslims, what is their perspective?

It has to be noted also that other examples of civic causes in Europe have not always been as peaceful as the European Muslims have been: the left wing movements or the altermondialist movement for example have been into much more violent riots and acts (there is not any G8 or G20 meeting that has not been the occasion to massive vandalism), but as it is not “ethnically tagged”, it was always been much more accepted. The altermondialist leader José Bové, currently representing Europe Ecology in the European Parliament has started his political career in destroying a transgenic culture field and a McDonald’s. Such acts, labelled in Europe as “civic desobediance” seem to never be applied to European Muslims: if one of them would act like José Bové, he would be labelled as violent and retrograde; very aware of this, the huge majority of the Muslim community in Europe generally act extremely peacefully and carefully, to not harm the global cause. It is this concern of the global cause that opens the European Muslims to questions wider than their own personnal benefit in the present situation.

In some extent, the European-Muslims have influenced the generation of their parents, bringing them to the fight for their rights that have been denied to them. So is the case of the African Second World War veterans, without any official recognition nor descent wages until the young generation revealed their history on the screens and medias, or the ongoing case of the 50s-60s Moroccan railway workers underpayed and discriminated. This kind of “retroactive” democratic influence isn’t surprising: the generation of muslims born in Europe, in many aspects, acts like an interface between their parents and the host country, due to a better educational background, a better knowledge of the language and of political institutions, etc.

The current economical crisis also resulted in a rise of the right-wing parties all over Europe, achieving to reveal this growing rift between the European-Muslims, as descendants of migrants, and the non-muslim Europeans: the word islamophobia became unfortunately very common. The growing general islamophobic feeling results in a hardening in legislations: ban of minarets in Switzerland being only one example. In today’s Europe, where racist behaviours and opinions are becoming more and more normal (not only against muslims but also against other migrants, like the gipsies), the European-Muslims seem to be an isolated case of civic struggle through the decades for rights. Now, they are in a new unseen situation: they have to fight against the loss of the rights they won only years ago. For example, after making some progress in the fight against discriminations in the 80s and 90s, we see now a rise of openly discriminating behaviour. The fight for equality is never won for good; maybe it has only begun.

The North African and Middle East is living now a turn in its History: the Tunisian and Egyptian popular revolutions opened the path to democracy to the whole region. It might take years, but it is clear now that people are fighting for their rights and for the end of an unfair society. The parallel here is interesting: a Europe in loss of democracy, an Arab World in progress towards democracy. And as a link between them this generation of young European people from Arab migrant parents, and most specifically from Arab Muslim parents (as Muslims not only account for the huge majority of Arabs in Europe, especially because of the Maghrebi migration, but also they had to face much more discriminations due to their religion, giving them more expertise in the fight for justice). The Arab (Muslim) Europeans have been following with interest the events since the beginning. They felt extremely proud of the Arab youth fighting for their freedom. Amongst governments, the recent events in the Arab World were paid a high attention for geostrategic reasons, but also because of the repercussion it might have on those European Muslims: as an example, French President Sarkozy clearly avoided to welcome Ben Ali after his fall down, fearing to  ignite an unrest among the Muslim community in France.

The situation might evolve to a surprising scenario: if we reach a point where Europe offers less freedom and rights to their Muslim citizens than the Arab countries, they might massively  migrate back to Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt, etc. Their parents came to Europe, they might go back to North Africa and Middle East. We are already witnessing for a couple of years now an increasing number of young European Muslims working in opening business in their country of origin, transfering their expertise into the local market, creating partnerships, bringing ideas not yet implemented in the Arab World. Many times we hear from young people, born in France, UK, Switzerland or Germany: “Why wouldn’t my arab country of origin benefit from all I can bring instead of Europe that day by day denies me the right to express my personnality, my culture, my religion?”.  The point here is to understand that they do not come back to the Arab World because they have no choice (having European citizenships protects them quite enough), but because they make the choice to give their added value to the country of origin. Moroccans, Tunisians, Algerians, Libyans, Egyptians, etc, that know the beginning will be difficult for them to adapt, but that want to make it. They know they are certainly going to earn less, but to live better, whilst they will participate in the local and global progress. Their parents were part of an economical migration wave, they are part of a ethical migration wave. Many of them, anyway, won’t migrate “physically” and will continue to live in Europe, but with a greatest concern of their civil role in Arab societies: most of this European Arabs carry european citizenships, but also arab citizenships, giving them the right to vote, to own in the country of origin or to represent it in International Organizations.

The European Arab (Muslim) youth and the Arab youth have many in common: education level, global awareness, similar values, similar goals and a great concern for democracy, human rights, civic rights. It would be interesting if they can benefit from each other’s experience and collaborate together to build a better and fair society, in Europe as well as in the Arab world. One one side they would fight corruption of the system, on the other side they would fight unethical exploitation of workers and ressources, in a situation that would guarantee a stable peaceful relation based on mutual benefit. They could meet in forums, establish partnerships, NGOs, transnational cooperations, exchange knowledge and open markets to each other, advise each other.

That would be a new nice kind of globalization.

Egypt: tweeting a constitution

So much has been said and written about the use of social medias in the Egyptian uprising. I won’t tell you anything you don’t already know if I tell you that the censorship and the official media propaganda made Facebook and Twitter the favored source of information for a young, urban and educated youth. You’d certainly know too that bloggers among other activists were phished by the Mukhabarat (Egyptian Intelligence) for their strong influence and that the strong political conscience of young Arabs surprised at the same time the old cast of autocrats AND the Western World. You certainly know all of this.

But since the stepdown of Mubarak, does the new democratic state still need so much activism on the social medias, or the newly free traditionnal medias (television, radio, newspapers) are enough? Now that everybody can openly speak their minds, will the social medias go back to what they were originally used for, socializing and entertainment, aren’t they? After all, in a democratic US and Europe, teenagers and young adults mainly tweet and facebook about their moods, party pictures or congregate into groups of interests for artistic activities or social events. As far as we can witness today in Egypt, no, the political role of social media information is not over, but the use has slightly changed: it went from an information channel when under repression, to an open debate scene since revolution.

The young egyptian bloggers do not have to hide anymore, they are even invited on TV broadcasts, their faces are known and their columns are published in newspapers. But even if this bit of “prestige” made to the political numerical scene on the traditionnal media scene is quite honouring, the #jan25 youth  (if you are familiar with the twitter popular hashtag for the egyptian contestation movement) do not seem to fall into line. Yes they read the news, yes they watch TV speeches, youtube video’s and Al Jazeera (Arabic or English), but they build away from any influence their own opinion – and they share it. The referendum for the new Constitution of the Republic of Egypt (dostoor in arabic) has been the occasion of a vaste, multipolar open debate. Twitter is used as a giant web 2.0 agora where thousands of voices can express at the same time without one shouting louder than others. Display pictures are replaced by “No” written in white on a red background or “Yes” on a green background (and all the derivatives and parodies), a simple way for every twitterer to declare what they intend to vote. Arguments and critics on amendments go back and forth, with or without # or @. Relevant civil actions are relayed, when they are too small to interest a traditionnal media (a newspaper will not “use the time” of the journalist it employs for a flyers distribution on the Tahrir square) or brainstorming sessions are improvised (like the #EgyptHas one a few days ago aiming in listing everything that would encourage tourists to come). And inbetween, some breaknews from other arab revolutions, the Egyptian feeling very supportive of Libya, Bahrein or Yemen, and some entertainment with songs or a funny video.

This large online agora is one of a new kind: it is not a sum of persecuted voices that cannot express elsewhere, it has become a normal way of political expression besides all the other means. The Twitter and Facebook do not make a revolution and a democracy, it is the sum of all the interactions in a civil society that do, and the social medias have been now as normal as anything like a text message, e-mail service or as complementary as an organized meeting: what matters is how they are used, if they are used to transmit the free opinions of people and their true minds, or if they are used and misused to spread propagands.  The main difference I see with the american/european social media scene is that the Egyptian couterpart is much less hierachized and specialized: the western world political content tweets and retweets go more into public figures or institutions with thousands of followers, witty bloggers and their fans, supporters of one or the other political parties (the young green party, etc) or activists among specific networks of similar interests, while the Egyptians seem to be in a more generalist perspective: very few are part of any institution of a kind, official stakeolders (like political parties) have a very limited social media activity (even for example somebody like the former Atomic Agency General Secretary, Nobel Prize winner and candidate for Egyptian presidency Mohammad Al Baradei have not that much impact on the social medias). Just speak your mind in 140 characters, use the appropriate tag to be accessible to the rest of the users who are discussing the same thing than you, and Marhaba!

This “non-organization” specifity of the Egyptian agora makes the work of those who want to influence opinions through mass numerical media difficult, if not impossible: for every single info shared, for every argument expressed, there are 10 people objecting and analyzing on the live, and the “non-organization” of the crowds makes it almost impossible to categorize people into “pro-” or “anti-” something. Meaning it is their clustering into categorizable group of ideas that make people be possibly analyzed and inflirtated by strategic media specialists who look for subtle yet efficient ways to influence. So that’s something that we should maybe learn from this for anywhere in the world: if you want to be targetable as less as possible to political communication campaigns and to opinion formating, do not stick your presence on social medias on the clusters around opinion leaders, affiliated groups or currents; you should rather follow people like you and me, normal citizen that share their views, don’t exclude other currents of thoughts than yours, use your critical mind for everything that you read from others without hesitating in criticizing an illogical opinion. Because, if we are agree that dictatorship restricts citizen freedom of speech and act in ways we know, we should also be aware that the opinion formatting and mind manipulation the advertising and political communication specialists trying to implement to increase the number of their devotees,is not exactly what we could call democraty.

Egyptians are this morning on their way to vote for the constitution. Thanks to smartphones, the Constitution referendum was not only debated fow weeks, it is now too precisely observed and reported over regularities and irregularities: still need external observers?  We read messages like: “At voting station in school in Helwan. Looks clean and well organized. Judges in every booth, teachers running process.Ok” or  “people reporting ballots not stamped in Heliopolis #dostor2011” or “I voted in AlManial ElE3dadeya things are very positive, police officers are helpful & all papers are stamped. Things are great.“.

Whatever the result of the referendum is, this morning we can say that the new democratic Egypt is here and intends to stay: the voices of the young and the less young are heard in polling stations, but also on the virtual public scene. Whether the result will be a “YES” or a “NO” for the Constitution amendments, the Egyptians have already won their first electoral battle: they went massively to vote and they freely chose. Sounds very promising: a poitical sciencce empirical theorem states that anything significant that happens in Egypt, tends to spread and happen afterwards in the rest of the Arab World.

The Awakening

Today I was at the cigar store of the train station, getting a pre-paid card for my phone. The shelves were full of newspapers and magazines of all kinds, of all languages. Most of the front pages were mentioning the Egypt protests, of course. One of them immediately caught my eye, mainly because of the picture I think – the portrait of a young man, the lower part of his face hidden by his scarf. It was the « Nouvel Obs » magazine, and it was titling « De Tunis au Caire, quand le monde arabe s’éveille » (From Tunis to Cairo, when the Arab World wakens). Wakens… awakening?

Definition: awakening [əˈweɪkənɪŋ əˈweɪknɪŋ] n the start of a feeling or awareness in a person

There is no day since the beginning of the worldwide mediatic coverage of the protests in Tunisia where I didn’t hear or read somewhere this word – awakening. Everywhere, I see journalists analyzing the events as the awakening of the arab word, the arab people, the arab street, the arab whatever. And everytime I wonder the same: what is before the awakening? Sleep or unconsciousness, isn’t it? Does it mean that we were worldwidely considered as being asleep or unconscious?

Maybe am I a bit touchy; maybe I shouldn’t think that much about what is – after all – just a word. But the fact is that everytime I am confronted with ‘the awakening’, I cannot help feeling slightly angry and insulted. Don’t we refer to awakening when it comes to the development of a young child gradually getting able to walk, speak or understand abstract concepts? Those who talk about the awakening of the Arabs, without any doubt, suggest that they were in some kind of lethargy until then, that unlike the rest of the people of the world, the Arabs were lost in some extra-dimensionnal realm of irrationality, unaware of the recent progress of History. There even was frequently journalists/analysts/politicians/whatever that were clearly assuming that our « slow » progress on the path leading to political and civil awareness makes it impossible for now to consider anything else than dictatorship for us. Very seriously. And that giving to Arabs democracy too soon could lead to disasters like whole nations falling into political-religious extremism, violence, chaos. It always sounded to me like a father explaining to his to his 16 years old son why he won’t give him the keys of the car: « Don’t you realize you would be dangerous for yourself and for the others? ».

When I read about « awakening », it makes me feel the same way than when I hear anybody saying that – I am giving you here a hint on how to get me mad in less than 2 minutes – « Columbus discovered America in 1492 ». Columbus did not discover America; the people that were already living on the american continent when he reached the shore were those who did. Or like when I consult some page on Wikipedia on some random african country and that under the section « History », the history starts… the day of the colonization of the country. As if the country was created out of nothing the day an army took possession of the land.

People tend to think that what they have not yet seen or noticed, do not exist; and when it becomes visible, they sometimes don’t get to understand that it is not an « awakening ». It is just that something was screening the view to any outside observer; like the Atlantic Ocean between Columbus and America.

Arabs, we, us, are not living presently our « awakening ». They always were fully conscious, fully aware. But this is what the oppression, after all, is about: seeing everything but being forced to keep silent. Being cautious; how to be anything else than cautious when you know that in some conditions, if you speak or protest, it’s your life, or even worse, your wife’s or husband’s, or your parents’ life that is treatened. And maybe it is because this heavy, unbearable barrier between the Arabs and their freedom of speech and act, the people in our countries always felt that much concerned about the palestinian or iraqi issue: it was the only political topics they could discuss without being put in danger; and read between the lines, it was the only way they were able to criticize their governments.

I always found for example that very few Tunisians will ever tell you directly anything about politics, but always amazed how most of them have an extended ability to give practical answers to overcome the issues created by the lack of citizen rights. As if they always were acting political (not in the derogatory meaning of the word) without speaking political. And when they found the first sign of weakeness of the oppressing entity, the movement was spontaneously initiated and followed. As for Egyptians, they have always been more keen to speak than Tunisians, but when it comes to acts, as they were living in certainly what is one of the most halting conditions you would ever imagine, they were making their way through paths you would never have guessed, and I always found them unbelievabily relaxed about it; just waiting for the right time to do the right thing. And it seems now the right time has come; the tunisian revolution was the triggering factor. Egyptians didn’t wait for that day to become aware of the political spoliation of their rights; they knew it already, it is just know it is also visible to the outside world: the view is no more screened.

Will the tunisian and egyptian protests be the triggering factor to other poeple (not only in the arab world) to defeat tyranny? I hope so and I think so. But again, they won’t create the awareness in other countries, they will just be what they needed for releasing the claims.

Hopefully this would lead to the awakening into a new understanding of our History.

Am I the citizen of three countries?

Although I have three citizenships (Swiss, Tunisian, Egyptian), I used to think, all my life, that only in Switzerland my opinion mattered, through my vote, and that dictatorship in my two countries of origine, and the fact I leave abroad, made my voice mute and useless.

I remember the day I received for the first time of my life, as a 18+ swiss citizen, my materiel de vote in my mailbox, it was in 2000 and it was a popular consultation on the rise of age of retirement for women from 62 to 64, I spent days reading all I could read about the topic, too afraid to make the wrong choice. The day I went to the polling station it was odd to me, I clearly felt for the first time of my life to not only be swiss or swiss african, but to be a swiss citizen who has her contribution to bring to Switzerland.

My parents have had Swiss citizenship later than I did – I was almost 20 at that time. The first time they received the materiel de vote, with their voter cards, I remember them so perfectly, laughing and grinning like kids oppening their Christmas Gifts, and telling me it is the first time of their lives they are asked their opinion through vote. At that time my parents were more than 40, but my father, egyptian, and my mother, tunisian, had to wait to be swiss in order to vote for the first time of their lives. I remember when they asked me how to proceed to vote; after the explanation I gave them I remember my mother’s first question was “But what do you think I should vote here? Yes or No?” (and all her life long we had always the same argument about the fact that every time we had to go for voting, she wanted to know what did I vote to vote the same) and my father asking me, while looking at the voting paper, where exactly does he have to write his name – above or below the  “yes” and “no” box?

The day I realized how strange it was to be on one side citizen of one of the most democratic countries – Switzerland – and on the other side “citizen” from two of the most repressive dictatorships of arab countries – Tunisia and Egypt – was the day I voted for the first time for a Tunisian vote. It was in 2002, and we had to chose wether or not we agree to modify the Tunisian Constitution. The Constitution was restricting the president to limited number of mandates, and the ‘popular consultation’ was about rising this restriction to an unlimited number of mandates – in other words, give the constitutional right to Ben Ali to stay a lifetime president. Me and my mother, with our voting cards, went to the Tunisian Consulate and were given the voting material. I remember the voting papers, one with “Yes” written in black on a white paper, “No” written in white on a black paper, and an enveloppe – a transparent enveloppe where nothing was easier to see the color of the paper inside of it. I asked one of the staff if I could have a copy of the constitution with highlights on the parts that are to be modified, he brought me a text telling me that the concerned parts were written in red…. but he gave me a black and white photocopy of the constitution.  When I entered the voting booth, I remember putting the white “yes” paper in my pocket, the “no” black paper in the enveloppe, together with the photocopy of the constitution, in order to make it invisible through the transparent enveloppe which one I chosed. After being out of the Consulate I felt melancholic and angry of how ridiculous all this sounded. When, In november of the same year, at the annual gathering of tunisians of Geneva at the occasion of our National Day, I remember the Ambassador self-congratulating about the successful vote and how each of us can witness how fair our democratic consultation was.

Presidential Elections of 2005 and 2009 were such a mascarade, with the same transparent voting enveloppes and the red paper for Ben Ali, who was re-elected with more than 95% of votes. I went to the 2005 vote to put all the ‘alternative’ candidates papers (4 or 5, I dont remember) in the enveloppe, embended in the red paper. I didn’t even bother going to the 2009 votation, for it was too ridiculous.

I never voted for any egyptian vote or election. I remember at age of 13 or 14 a conversation with my aunt Sohir (at the age where you believe so much in your own stuff that you really look down on adults who tell you about being realistic and compromise, etc, etc), where she said “why should I want for a president a guy we don’t know when we already have one we know? One has to be satisfied or God can send you worse”. And later I never asked for my egyptian voting card, after learning from my father that his Uncle, my grand-uncle Ebrahim was a ‘Muslim Brotherhood’ Society member (“Ikhwan el Moslemine”) and that the day Nasser established their illegality my grand uncle burnt everything, every evidence he had that he was part of the Society.

Before 14th of January I never felt my voice had something any interesting elsewhere than in Switzerland, first because of our democratic system, second because of living here, while I always felt useless to Tunisia and Egypt by dictatorship, but more because of the fact of living abroad – I always felt like I had no really any existence in my two countries of origin – as if I hadn’t “deserved” the right to be called citizen. To be citizen is to vote, but also to work in and for the country, to be part of the everyday life. And without any right to vote – really vote I mean – I was nor a political citizen, nor a factual citizen. Would any of my egyptian or tunisian fellows living there consider me ever anything else than some special kind of tourist (even if I don’t feel myself to be so), coming at summer because I miss the family and the country; because there, I dont own a car, I rent it, I dont see the kids growing up continuously, I only get snapshots? And that question always, alway asked: do you prefer Switzerland or Egypt/Tunisia? How to explain that I prefer none of them, I just dont really get the point of it, as if I was asked who do you love the more, your father and your mother? That despite the fact that I have the perspective to go back live in Egypt or Tunisia (or any muslim country, especially if I get married to a non-egyptian or non-tunisian) before I have kids – for it is clear to me I want my children to be raised in a country where they are not a minorité religieuse where people ask them (as it is a growing tendency in Europe since September 2001) if they are more faithful to Europe or Islam (as if a geographical location was any comparision with a religious entity) – I always felt so far I would be a citizen of Tunisia and Egypt only the day I will be resident there.

But After 14th of January, as Ben Ali stepped down, the perspective slightly changed: in six months I will be voting for a presidential election where my voice will count, whether I live abroad or not. How would I direct my choice towards one of the other of the candidates? Of course my choices are more driven towards the ideologies I believe in and away from those I don’t – the french-like ‘laicité’ opponents like Marzouki no way I’m ever going to give my voice to any of them.  But anyway, the gap that separates me and the day-to-day life knowledge of somebody living in Tunisia, how can I fill it? And now that I see that Egypt has started to follow the Jasmin Revolution path, and that things even go much beyond all expectations, the same question is to be relevant for Egypt also? I try, of course, to do my little own contribution with what I have in hand, but from far, is it enough, is it appropriate? How would I know? I’d certainly never know but now that first time of my life I had the feeling after January the 14th that I am not only tunisian person but also a tunisian citizen, not only an egyptian person, but also an egyptian citizen, the time is really coming for me to answer to THE question: I always knew I can be without any internal conflict a swiss and a tunisian and egyptian person, that I was a muslim-european and is not afraid to raise my voice for what I believe are our rights as europeans with a strong conscience on what we believe is our philosophy and contiousness as muslims, but now I am also another kind of citizen.

Can I really be citizen of three countries? Defend three Constitutions, look after the interests of three countries, one of them being neutral, the two remaining part of a cultural block that is not neutral? Feel three times patriotic, sing three national anthems? Or am I only one citizen, one citizen of one ideology, that has the right and the chance to participate to the implementation of the so said ideology in three different countries?

My friend Anais who is swiss with peruvian origins and with whom I shared my concern gave me, as an answer, a new question, a clever one. She asked me if I could imagine defending the interests of Switzerland/Tunisia/Egypt against any other interests of another country… to wich of these countries would I be able to fight and dedicate my life. Currently I am still trying to sort out the answer – and certainly I began to write this note not to give to the reader (who anyway is certainly not that interested in my own personnal inner debates) the answer to the question, but to find out what it is.

What I know for sure is that chosing between Egypt, Tunisia and Switzerland ‘s interests would it be like chosing between my father’s, my mother’s and my adoptive mother’s interests. I would never be able to harm any of them to defend any other of them, but I will always be able to give my own soul to protect any one of them if it is in my hand to do so. I do not share my love in three for them, I have three different loves. At this point I feel very lucky that I belong to three countries that have different interests, yet not really antagonist interests – not as if I were half egyptian and half israelian for example.

And what I feel now while I am writing these lines is that the one thing that stands in the middle, that links everything together, is not that I am european or african, or swiss or tunisian or egyptian, but that I am a muslim, that knows that only my moral values can make me chose not the interests of a country or another one, but the make me chose the right thing in each situation.

And maybe now I feel for the first time of my life what it is to be part of the Umma, the muslim nation: forget your frontiers but not your moral limits, don’t fight for your country with a patriotic resolution, regardless if the cause is just or not, but fight for your country to follow an ethical path. My two green passeports and my red passeport are not my identities, they are the pacific tools given to me to allow me to act for a change where I belong. Yes I am a Swiss-Tunisian-Egyptian person, a Swiss-Tunisian-Egyptian citizen, but above all I am the carrier of values which I deeply believe are my way to give the best part of myself to the human kind.