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Since then the military has controlled the government and members of the Muslim Brotherhood control Parliament.

Marco Werman speaks with the BBC’s Yolande Knell about the power struggle within Egypt.

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Twenty-six-year-old Josh Leffler sits in a Cairo cafe smoking a water pipe while men play dominoes and watch TV nearby. The American teacher doesn’t look stereotypically Egyptian, but after four years of living in downtown Cairo, he does blend in. And he loves it.

“I can go to my regular café anytime of the day and I will always sit with people,” Leffler says. “If I go to a coffee shop in Los Angeles and do this it doesn’t quite work like that, and so this aspect of community, it’s really nice.”

Yet even for Leffler who has a community here, the past year has been tense. During the revolution he got detained a few times. And lately with the protests downtown he’s felt like some Egyptians look at him differently as a foreigner.

“After I was detained a couple of times I began to act much more careful,” he said. That includes keeping his camera hidden when walking on the streets.

Khaled Fahmy, the chair of the history department at the American University in Cairo said the anti-foreigner sentiment that Leffler is experiencing doesn’t come out of nowhere.

There have been foreign plots in Egypt before, like the notorious Lavon Affair in 1954, when Israel was accused of recruiting Egyptians to plant bombs inside Egypt. And Fahmy said Egyptians don’t forget..

“Egyptians are very aware, in their recent history, of outside interventions. So this is a sensitive point, more so than elsewhere,” he said. “But that’s not the issue. The issue now is that there is a deliberate use of this xenophobic language, of this suspicion of foreigners.”

Fahmy and other critics say the current government – the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, or SCAF – is taking this very real sense of outside threat and whipping it up into fullblown xenophobia through State TV and radio.

“There is a deliberate use of this xenophobic language, of this suspicion of foreigners by SCAF and by the Minister of International Cooperation,” he said.

Hossam Baghat, Director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said there’s always been racism in Egypt. But these days his organization gets lots of complaints from people who have never been targeted before.

“In the past most of the complaints we received were by migrants, or refugees or asylum seekers with black skin that were subject to racially motivated harassment in Egypt,” Baghat said. “But since January of 2011 most of the complaints have been received by people who were targeted because of their fair skin or because they come from the West.”

There have been verbal and physical attacks, as well as citizen arrests. Baghat said foreigners are caught in the crossfire as the Egyptian government tries to undermine the continued protests.

“It presents the political protest movement in Egypt as being primarily pushed by the famous foreign agendas. And the foreign agendas are normally understood to mean western agendas,” he said.

Rasha Azaizy, spokesperson for the Egyptian Tourism Ministry, said there may seem to be a lack of security on the streets. But she didn’t see any hostility towards tourists or foreigners.

“It is not aimed at foreigners, it is just random,” she said. “And because of the language barrier, or the randomness of the whole thing. Stop and search is something that can happen in any city in the world. Egyptians are extremely warm and welcoming people. Very friendly.”

Azaizy said even with the unrest this year 10 million tourists came to Egypt, but that’s a drop of 30 percent. Even so, Historian Khaled Fahmy said it’s clear there is a concerted campaign against foreigners. And he said the Egyptian government shouldn’t just worry about the safety of tourists, but about the very foundation of Egyptian society.

“Egypt throughout its long history thrived not by being shunned off and shut out and inward looking, but rather by being open and engaged, and by interacting.”

As for American teacher Josh Leffler, he still considers Egypt his second home, and hopes to stay. But he added, “I’ll see how it goes.”

The unrest was sparked off Wednesday night when a brawl after a soccer match in Port Said left 74 people dead.

Violence has spread to Cairo and other cities, where protesters have clashed with police and hundreds have been wounded.

Two deaths were reported in Suez on Thursday.

The crisis has turned political, with protesters blaming the military and the police for failing to protect fans at the soccer match.

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Marco Werman: I am Marco Werman, this is The World. Cairo’s Tahrir Square was filled with angry protesters today. They were angry at Egypt’s military authorities and police for failing to prevent last night’s tragedy at a soccer stadium in Port Said. Clashes between rival fans left more 70 people dead but this was a soccer riot with political ramifications. Some of the fans who were killed belonged to a group notoriously critical of the security forces, both now and before last year’s revolution. In a few minutes, we’ll hear more on how soccer and politics are intertwined in Egypt. First, we turn to reporter Ursula Lindsey in Cairo.

Ursula Lindsey: The mood is tense. People have been protesting all day in central Cairo, many of them soccer fans, in the same location in which some very deadly violence has taken place in the last few months. There’s a mood of complete frustration. Perhaps, something that’s somewhat surprising is that although this is a conflict that broke out between the soccer fans of two different teams, in fact, most of the hostility is being focused on the army and the police for not managing the situation rather than the two teams blaming each other. There is some of that, but in Cairo tonight actually what’s happening is protesters are trying to march on the Ministry of Interior chanting anti-police and anti-army slogans saying that this latest incident of violence and lack of public order is further evidence that the army generals that currently run the country need to step down.

Werman: That raises the issue, how big a blow is this to an Egypt trying to move gradually forward from the revolution? What does it mean for the country’s political transition?

Lindsey: Well, this is just the latest in what seems to be almost regular explosions of violence and breakdown in public order. The transition period so far has seen a lot of these kinds of instances and, to a large degree, they point to the shortcomings of the Egyptian police which has not been able to manage public order in the transition period and which was used by the Mubarak regime as the tool of brute repression and has not been reformed since the fall of Mubarak. The riot police, the forces that should manage, carry out crowd control are underpaid, under-trained conscripts and, basically, we see the police alternate between abuse, between beating and sometimes killing people and between standing by and being very inefficient at managing public safety. All of this, of course, exacerbates the political uncertainty and the political tensions every time one of these crises on the street breaks out. These scenes of violence absorb everybody’s energies, create these huge debates and what we see now, of course, is this ongoing argument over whether the army generals are capable of managing the country and managing the transition.

Werman: You know, critics are saying the military-led transitional government let this happen. Some fans, apparently, brought knives to the stadium; police didn’t conduct the standard weapons search, it said. Is there any evidence that there was tacit support for the mayhem?

Lindsey: There isn’t firm evidence of that. Now, there are a lot of conspiracy theories which is also part of the environment of this confusing, chaotic transition period. A lot of people have voiced suspicions over why the situation was allowed to slip out of control this way saying, “The police generally assures security at soccer games; why weren’t they able to do so this time?” Emergency Law, which is law that allows the government to arrest and detain and gives it a lot of special powers that are politically repressive, is currently under discussion in Egypt and some people have pointed to that and said that, perhaps, this was allowed to happen to give the authorities an excuse to defend Emergency Law and other authoritarian powers.

Werman: Reporter Ursula Lindsey speaking with us from Cairo.

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Dorsey’s been scribbling furiously since the terrible violence in Port Said.

Marco Werman speaks with Dorsey about what’s behind the violence and perhaps the reaction or lack of it by Egyptian authorities.

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Marco Werman: The violence yesterday in Egypt involved rival groups of hardcore soccer fans known as Ultras. Supporters of the local Port Said team, Al-Masry, attacked the Ultra rooting for Cairo’s Al-Ahly. And police at the stadium reportedly stood by for the most part. That’s significant because the Cairo Ultras have a long history of clashing with police. They also played a key role in the protests against police and other security forces during Egypt’s revolution last year. James Dorsey writes about the intersection between soccer and politics. His blog is called The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer.

James Dorsey: Soccer in Egypt as well as in the rest of the Middle East is from its inception political and has been political ever since. So, none of this violence is purely soccer related. Soccer in the Middle East is a battlefield, and that battle is often fought very bloody.

Werman: The Ultras have some political significance, partly because of the origins of their team, Al-Ahly, and partly because of the stand they took during Egypt’s revolution last year, pushing back against the forces of law and order in Tahrir Square. Is there a political backdrop to the Port Said team, Al-Masry?

Dorsey: Every team was politically founded. Those political origins really don’t mean much anymore. It means nothing, far likely to be anti-monarchists in a country where the monarchy no longer, hasn’t existed for 50 years. On top of that, in essence you have within every club three groups. You have the fans who by in large are anti-regime and clashed with the regime over a number of years prior to Mubarak’s departure. You have management, which was appointed by the regime. And you have the players who because the regime wanted to associate itself with soccer in a bid to shore up its own image, being able to distract attention and at times manipulate the motions, who became celebrities and they were showered with gifts, with attention by the regime. And so they stood on the sidelines during the revolt and that’s created tensions in the relations between the fans and the players.

Werman: So the Ultras, it’s a generic that doesn’t just apply to Al-Ahly.

Dorsey: That’s correct, Ultras first appeared in I think it was 1939 in Brazil, and then the next Ultra groups were in the 1950s in Italy. And there are differences between the groups, but fundamentally they are militant committed soccer fans who feel that they are the sole owners of the club and the only really true supporters. Management in many of the countries, as well as the players, are viewed as hired guns. When they get a better offer they move on. In Egypt, the management is not only a hired guy, but it’s an agent of the government.

Werman: And the Ultras who went to Tahrir Square to support the protestors last year, were they specifically Ultras in support of al-Ahly or various Ultras?

Dorsey: You have two major soccer groups in Cairo, Ahly is one, and it’s arch rival, Zamalek, which was the British club many, many years ago. And the Ultras for both of those groups were equally important and equally represented in the anti-Mubarak demonstrations. They are Ultras and they perceive themselves as such. They are extreme, so that’s why they’re called Ultras. They are ultra in the way they support their party.

Werman: James Dorsey is a researcher at the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute. His blog is The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer, which we’ll link to on our site, theworld.org. James Dorsey, thanks a lot.

Dorsey: My pleasure, take care.

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In the basement of the Indonesian embassy a 28-year-old woman we’ll call Susan sits on a mattress in her polyester pajamas. Asked how much money she made in the nine years she was a domestic worker in Egypt, she slapped her hands together.

“None at all,” she said.

“Year after year I asked for my wages, but my employer said, ‘later, later, later.’ For nine years. I feel sad and depressed because I came from Indonesia to work for my family. I am the bread-winner of my family,” Susan said.

Susan was locked inside an Egyptian house for most of the past decade. Sometimes her employers didn’t give her food. Sometimes they beat her. Without money or contacts, she was afraid to escape.

“My employers knew that I was here alone. They knew for nine years that I was heartbroken, they knew I was heartbroken,” she said.

But last September her employers took her on a trip with them to the beach, and she finally got the opportunity to run away.

Susan said she had been so isolated that when she first arrived at the embassy in Cairo that she didn’t know that there had been a revolution in Egypt. She thought Hosni Mubarak was still president. Now she’s one of five former domestic workers taking shelter while they seek their unpaid wages.

“When I got to the embassy I called my family,” Susan said. “They thought I was dead. My sister didn’t recognize my voice, my mother too. She didn’t recognize my voice.”

Susan laughed as she washed dishes with some of the other women in the embassy kitchen. Ironically, the revolution that Susan didn’t know had happened may turn out to be good for her.

Ali Andika Wardhana works for the Indonesian Embassy and said these days, he and his colleagues have more mobility within the Egyptian government to help workers like Susan prosecute their abusive employers.

“Now we are having direct access to the prosecutor’s office, only after the revolution. Before revolution we didn’t have contact, but now we coordinate on things that matter to the migrant workers,” Wardhana said.

But Susan and the others are getting help only because their cases are so egregious, and fall under Egypt’s new laws against human trafficking. The country’s labor law doesn’t recognize “domestic workers.”

In a villa in a wealthy suburb of Cairo, two Filipino women danced to childrens music with some toddlers. The toddlers’ father, a businessman who spoke on the condition he wouldn’t be named, employs three Filipinos to clean and care for the kids. They make about $400 a month, a lot of money in Egypt. Susan, had she gotten paid, would have only made $120.

The businessman said having foreign domestic help is an open secret in Egypt.

“I wouldn’t mind signing a contract but I cannot sign a contract with an illegal someone who is working illegally,” the man said, “because (they come with) it’s a student visa and they’re not allowed to work anyways.”

Their illegal status is why domestic workers are so susceptible to abuse, said Hossam Baghat. He’s the director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and his group advocates changing Egypt’s discriminatory labor code.

“Effectively it removes this entire profession, this entire group of men and women, completely outside the realm of any legal protection,” Baghat said.

And no one knows how many foreign domestic workers actually live here. Estimates range anywhere from 5,000 to 80,000.

Back at the Indonesian embassy, Susan said while she’s sad about her experience in Egypt, she’s not desperate. She’s got a new lawyer and as soon as she gets her money, Susan hopes to return to Indonesia and get married. As for her former employers, if they’re not punished, she fears for the next Indonesian they might hire.

The bazaar or souk we are looking for is in Egypt’s capital, Cairo.

This marketplace in the city’s Islamic district has been continuously open since the Middle Ages and remains very popular and crowded even today.

Shoppers can wander around the narrow alleys or pop into tiny cafes serving strong coffee and haggle over prices with vendors who sell everything from chandeliers and spices to hookahs and shisha.

But there is something else that unfortunately shows up sale: illegal ivory.

Khan el-Khalili is the answer to the Geo Quiz.

Anchor Marco Werman talks to wild life expert Esmond Martin who investigated the Egyptian ivory trade for the conservation group Traffic.

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The younger LaHood directs the Egypt Program of the International Republican Institute.

Egypt accuses the Institute and other non-profit organizations of illegally funding civil society groups in Egypt.

Lisa Mullins gets more on the story from New York Times reporter David Kirkpatrick.

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Lisa Mullins: I am Lisa Mullins and this is The World. Tensions are rising between the United States and Egypt. Washington would like to see a quicker transition in Cairo from military rule to democracy. Egyptian authorities though don’t like outsiders trying to influence their affairs. The latest sign of that is a decision to bar several US citizens from leaving Egypt. They include Sam LaHood. That’s the son of President Obama’s Transportation Secretary, Ray LaHood. The younger LaHood directs the Egypt program of the International Republican Institute. Egypt accuses the institute and other US non-profit organization of illegally funding pro democracy groups inside Egypt. David Kirkpatrick is covering this story for the New York Times. He is now in Cairo. So what happened to bring this too ahead specifically with this US cabinet member’s son in Egypt.

David Kirkpatrick: Well, Sam LaHood tried to take a trip to visit a friend in Dubai several days ago and he was stopped at the airport. And they told him you are not allowed to travel because you are under investigation. And at that point lawyers from his organization called up the Egyptian prosecutor and said, “Is this true, and who else?” And so they learned that, I believe, five of their employees or four national are barred from travel. And then, their sister organization, the National Democratic Institute made a similar inquiry and learned that some six of their employees, including three Americans were also barred from travel. And this follows a kind of escalation of anti-American rhetoric about foreign funding through these groups. And then, that culminated one month ago in a raid on the offices of a number of foreign funded non-governmental organizations here, including those two American groups, a raid in which computers, files, and money was confiscated and their offices were closed and are not yet reopened.

Mullins: So what is the government saying about why it has taken these measures? What do they say that these organizations and these people did wrong?

Kirkpatrick: Well the government is not saying a word about this. The foreign ministry says, “Well, look this is the decision of the prosecutor and we have nothing to do with it.” A lawyer who represents some of these groups said, “Don’t read too much into it. It’s not that out of the ordinary. They’re considering these people a flight risk in a way that Egyptians would not be a flight risk because they have foreign passports.” On the other hand, Mr. LaHood and other people who work for these groups say, “Look, we’ve signed statements on copies of our passports saying we’re staying. We keep showing up for all our interrogations. We’re no flight risk whatsoever. And by the way, what did we do wrong?” because these groups are by American standards relatively innocuous. They teach the kind of nuts and bolts of how to organize a political campaign, figure out who your constituents are, pin up some flyers, sign a petition for a petition drive, that kind of stuff, which does not feel particularly subversive to someone who is used to operating in western context.

Mullins: So why might it have been subversive inside?

Kirkpatrick: Well now, from the Egyptian point of view under the Mubarak government, the government of Hosni Mubarak who was deposed a year ago, they passed a law that said non-governmental organizations need to be licensed one, and any money coming into the country can only go to licensed groups and has to go through or with the approval of the Egyptian government. And that law is still on the books. Since the Revolution, in the expectation that things were moving in a more democratic and open direction the Americans have dispensed that and decided they could just give money to whatever non-governmental organization they choose in Egypt. And that is where the dispute has arisen. So if Egypt’s current military rulers were trying to find a way to sort of maximally irk Washington and the American authorities, they’ve pretty much found it, they’ve come very close to it.

Mullins: To what ultimate end? We should add here that the US is still giving if I’m not mistaking $1.3 billion to the military, to the Egyptian military.

Kirkpatrick: Why they’re doing this, I have to say puzzles me. It’s a little bit like biting the hand that feeds you. The Egyptian military which is to such a great extend dependent on the US government for its own financial resources is awfully picky about who else in Egypt might turn to the US government for financial resources.

Mullins: All right. David Kirkpatrick, Cairo Bureau Chief of the New York Times in Cairo. Thanks very much.

Kirkpatrick: Thank you.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

The demonstrations were largely peaceful. But pro-democracy activists complain that the Egyptian military keeps violating the human rights of protesters.

And that puts them on a collision course with supporters of the military.

After dark, in a dusty cul-de-sac in a ramshackle section of Cairo’s Heliopolis neighborhood, several young Egyptian men are staging a show. They’ve rigged a laptop to a precarious tower of old speakers; and they’re projecting a film onto a 3-by-3-foot screen.

Called “Kazeboon,” the film is a compilation of video clips that show Egyptian security forces chasing, beating and shooting at protesters during clashes in November and December.

Those clips are interspersed with news footage of generals from Egypt’s ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, or SCAF. The generals deny that any abuse has taken place; they stress that the armed forces have exercised self-restraint. With its grainy footage and melodramatic soundtrack, the video is neither slick nor subtle, but that’s not the point.

“We organized this event to show people who didn’t go to Tahrir Square what is happening, and to make them aware of crimes the SCAF has committed,” said 22-year-old Ahmed Khalil.

Khalil, a computer science student, helped organize tonight’s viewing and said he is happy with the turnout. But in such a densely populated area, when Cairo’s famed nightlife is just hitting its stride, it would seem that 150 young men isn’t much of a crowd.

“Most of the people who live in this neighborhood aren’t interested in coming here,” Khalil said. “They prefer to stay at home because they believe that SCAF will secure the country. So even this number of people is a positive sign.”

Then, almost as if Khalil predicted it, the street behind us filled with young men chanting in support of Egypt’s ruling military council.

The activists and the pro-military youth faced off with competing chants.

The activists shouted, “Down with the military regime.”

Their rivals yelled, “the army and the people are one hand.”

Cars and buses stopped in the street while passengers gawked; and pedestrians whipped out their cell phones to take pictures. Then, after a few shoves, the youths separated.

The incident in Heliopolis illustrates how divided Egyptians are as they mark the one-year anniversary of the start of Egypt’s revolution.

The “Askar Kazeboon,” or “Military Liars,” campaign is an attempt by activists to win more people to their view that little has changed since the revolution that overthrew long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak. SCAF forces, they say, are just as brutal as Mubarak’s were.

The most recent clashes took place in mid-December and made an icon of a young Egyptian woman who was filmed being violently kicked by black-clad riot troops while lying prone, her black veil or niqab pulled up to expose her bra.

“At that point we decided enough is enough and we have to start a campaign of truth showing people what really happens on the street, altering their major media capability by going to the street with the truth,” said Ramy Shaath, general coordinator of the Free Egyptians Group which is helping coordinate some Kazeboon viewings.

Shaath said they are trying to counter Egypt’s powerful state media machine, which owns television and radio stations and newspapers. State media routinely carries the statements of the Egyptian generals – without any balance – who paint pro-democracy activists as thugs.

Egyptians who can’t afford satellite dishes, Shaath said, are entirely dependent upon state media to help form their opinions.

But is the Askar Kazeboon campaign convincing anyone? Or, is it only attracting angry young men who already view the military council as the enemy?

“I have seen the shocking effect on people. I have seen people shocked,” Shaath said. “They were not believing what they were watching and started relating the lies they heard on state TV to the reality they are watching and started remember the kind of lies they used to hate from the Mubarak regime.”

And so on Wednesday, when tens of thousands of Egyptians poured into Tahrir Square, it was with a sense of trepidation. At the day’s end, Egypt’s health ministry said around 150 people were mildly injured – but not by security forces.

Most were accidentally crushed by the large celebratory crowds in the square. Riot police and troops didn’t have the opportunity to clash with protesters. They were conspicuously absent from the celebrations.

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What started on January 25 last year ended with the resignation of longtime President Hosni Mubarak.

Wednesday, crowds gathered once again in Tahrir Square to mark the first anniversary of their uprising.

Anchor Lisa Mullins talks to reporter Noel King, who is in Cairo, about the mood of the crowds today.

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Lisa Mullins: I’m Lisa Mullins, and this is The World. A co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI, and WGBH in Boston. One year ago today, the crowds started gathering slowly at first, in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. First, a few hundred, then a few thousand. And eventually, hundreds of thousands of people turned out for a massive anti-government demonstration.

Man 1: I’m protesting for hope. I’m protesting for change. I’m protesting against a government that doesn’t listen to it’s people.

Man 2: Incredible scenes here. I never thought I’d see this in Cairo. This is President Mubarak’s governmenting headquarters, and it is in flames. This was a symbol of Mubarak’s power, of Mubarak’s regime.

Man 3: This regime has remained in power for thirty years. We had more than enough. My son is not going to suffer what I had to suffer.

Mullins: What started on January 25th last year and ended with long time president Hosni Mubarak’s resignation. Today crowds gathered once again in Tahrir Square, to mark the first anniversary of the uprising. Reporter Noel King joins us from Cairo. One year ago today, Noel, Cairo was filled with a sense of hope and change. What has it felt like in Tahrir Square today?

Noel King: Well it was a pretty extraordinary scene in Tahrir Square today. You had tens of thousands of people, possibly even hundreds of thousands, although I’d hate to venture a guess on the exact number, packed in tight to the Square. Overwhelmingly the mood was one of jubilant celebration. People were proud to be there, they were happy to be there, and that was mixed with a fair amount of cynicism and pessimism from some people who said, “We are absolutely thrilled that we overthrew Hosni Mubarak and that we’re standing here twelve months later. At the same time we just don’t think Egypt has moved quickly enough toward the kind of democratic transition that we were hoping for when we came out in force twelve months ago.”

Mullins: We heard that there were some rival stages that were set up in the Square with some banners carrying conflicting messages. The Islamist groups are celebrating the anniversary. They now make up a majority of Egypt’s parliament. On the other side, pro-democracy supporters who want even more change, including the resignation of the ruling military council. Were the two sides, how were they interacting, or were they even interacting with each other?

King: Well that’s a very apt description. What you saw today in Tahrir really depended on which side of Tahrir you were standing in. The Muslim Brotherhood did a wonderful job, as they are known to do, of organizing people, of getting them out in huge numbers. They were singing songs, they had lots of chants, they were a sea of Egyptian flags as far as the eye could see. On the other side you had the youth activists, who said again and again from the top of their stage, “The Revolution isn’t over yet. We haven’t seen the end of the January 25th movement.” For the most part, I would say people were sort of circulating between those two groups. The conservative Salafi Nour Party had their own stage. Not such a great turnout, at least in the early morning and afternoon, for them, and some of Egypt’s liberal political parties were similarly neglected. I’d say the Brotherhood and the youth activists had the big numbers today, but for a lot of people, it was a day of observation. You saw families with young children walking in between the groups, and just sort of taking it all in with a sense of awe and wonder. And again, quite a bit of pride.

Mullins: You say there were families with young children. We know that last year there were families on Tahrir Square, there were women that were out as well as men. I wonder if there is much of a presence of women out on the Square today.

King: You know, I spent a lot of the day talking to women about where they think Egypt stands a year after the revolution. Women have faced extraordinary challenges. They’ve been some of the victims of abusive by police and security forces. They put in a very poor showing in the parliamentary elections, just about 2% of the incoming parliamentarians are Egyptian women. However, overwhelmingly the women I spoke to said, “Look, we’re in a good mood today. We know that there are challenges that remain, but for the moment, let’s just remain optimistic and positive and see where we can take it after today.” And there was a young woman who I thought really summed up the day really well. She was a student. She was only seventeen years old. We were talking for a long time about some of the challenges that Egypt is facing, and she was very representative, I think, of Egyptians on the whole. She’s a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, a veiled young woman but fairly moderate in her beliefs. And I said to her, “You know, there are so many people out here today who, despite their optimisms, say they’re worried about Egypt’s transition to democracy, they’re concerned about the military council, the staff holding onto power.” And she said to me, “Well I know what my plan is. I’m seventeen. I’m gonna graduate high school, and then when I graduate, I’m gonna run for a seat in the new parliament, and I’m gonna help turn things around.” I was really struck and impressed by that, both because of her youth, her optimism, and the fact that she had a pretty firm plan, which you wouldn’t always have seen in Egypt, but you sure see now.

Mullins: Alright, Noel King, joining us from Cairo, where she has spent hours today on Tahrir Square. Thank you.

King: Thank you, Lisa.

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Egyptians celebrate the first anniversary of January 25 popular uprising after a momentous year of change.

The announcement comes a day before the anniversary of the first demonstration in Cairo’s Tahrir Square last year.

The state of emergency has been in place for decades, and gives police increased powers. Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with reporter Noel King in Cairo.

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Lisa Mullins: I’m Lisa Mullins and this is The World. Today, Egypt’s top military ruler relented on one of the main demands of pro-democracy activists. Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi announced a partial lifting of the country’s emergency laws. They’ve been in effect for decades, greatly restricting human rights in Egypt. Tantawi made the announcement on television, making reference to Egypt’s new parliament.

Hussein Tantawi: [speaking Arabic] Today, after the people had their say and chose their representatives in the people’s assembly, I have taken the decision to end the state of emergency in the entire republic, except in confronting crimes of thuggery. This decision will take effect as of January 25.

Mullins: That would be tomorrow, exactly one year since the start of massive anti-government demonstrations in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. Reporter Noel King is in Cairo and she says it’s easy to see why most Egyptians dislike the emergency laws.

Noel King: They’ve forbidden any gatherings of more than five people. They’ve allowed censorship in the media and elsewhere. They’ve allowed civilians to be dragged in front of military courts and tried in front of military tribunals. And they’ve allowed the indefinite detention of people who are charged with crimes like thuggery and terrorism. So, in many ways these laws have governed just about every aspect of Egyptian life for the past 30 years.

Mullins: Okay, so the Field Marshal Tantawi who we heard from, who worked for Hosni Mubarak for something like 20 years as his defense minister, he is now saying that the only time the emergency laws will still apply is in the case of thuggery. What defines a thug?

King: Well, that’s really the tough part in Egypt. Thuggery is a very, very broad definition. So, for example, if you are holding a peaceful demonstration in the street in Egypt. You’re not doing anything much, but you’re expressing your displeasure with the government, you can be hauled into prison and then hauled into court and charged with thuggery. There’s never been a very firm definition of what it entails. Now, in the past few months some of the activists who have remained in opposition to the regime after Hosni Mubarak fell have taken to calling and to jokingly calling themselves thugs. So you can see that this relationship between so-called thugs and the regime has always been a tense one and it’s really difficult to determine who a thug is. Many people in Egypt would say if the regime doesn’t agree with you, doesn’t agree with what you’re doing, then you’re a thug.

Mullins: Well, I guess at this point, I mean if you have young protestors chanting “We are thugs” it signifies something of a lack of trust in the government as it is right now. I wonder to what extent Egyptians broadly trust that the military will retreat to its barracks, especially now that there is a parliament that is in place that has met, the fact that there’s gonna be a presidential election coming up in a matter of months…is there much trust now between the people of Egypt and this military government?

King: That is a spectacularly difficult question. If you have 82-85 million people in Egypt, you probably have 82-85 million different opinions on just how much the government can be trusted. A broad swath of Egyptian society believes that the staff, the military council are the only ones to keep Egypt on track, who are able to keep Egypt on track. However, there is still a broad base of support in the activist community, a smaller community to be sure, but a very stalwart belief that Egypt’s military council is doing wrong by Egypt.

Mullins: Does it look like there will be Egyptians who test the lifting of the majority of emergency laws now?

King: Well, tomorrow what we’re looking at is the first anniversary of the beginning of the Egyptian revolution. And right now it’s really unclear what’s going to happen. So many people we expect will turn out in Tahrir Square tomorrow will be peaceful, will be overjoyed to be celebrating a year since the fall of Hosni Mubarak. On the other hand there is that smaller cadre of pro-democracy activists who say the revolution never finished, and the question is will tomorrow be the day that they decide they want to finish it?

Mullins: All right, reporter Noel King in Cairo. Thank you.

King: Thank you.

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Imbaba protest in 2011 (Photo: monasosh/Flickr)

Atef is a lawyer and a lifetime resident of Imbaba. He leads me into a labyrinth of dirt alleyways, each no more than a few meters wide. The damp air is thick with dust and the smell of sewage.

Imbaba is one of the most densely-populated places in the world. Almost a million people live here, crammed into an area three times more crowded than Manhattan.

The streets all look the same. It feels like a person could be lost here for the rest of their life.

“This has been my neighborhood for a long time,” Atef said. “So, of course, I know all the streets. I know what leads to where.”

A year ago, Atef joined the uprising in Tahrir Square.

Those protests were about toppling Hosni Mubarak. For Atef, that meant changing the way Egypt works.

For decades, Mubarak’s government saw places like Imbaba as a liability – a potential source of opposition. The government simply ignored the neighborhood, failing to provide even the most basic services.

People would complain. But the former regime ruled Imbaba by sowing fear. The dreaded agents of state security were always listening. And for anyone who dared criticize the regime, arrest, torture and even death were never far off.

“The regime wanted us to think of them as the father and the mother of all the people,” Atef said. “The government does everything and the people do nothing. They don’t participate in political life. In one party rule, the people weren’t allowed to have a role.”

Atef believes that if Egyptian democracy is really going to work, people must be able to take control of their own communities. That’s where his neighborhood committee comes in. During last winter’s uprising, Khaled organized a group of local men to protect homes and business from looters and thugs.

They armed themselves with whatever they had – broomsticks, machetes, crowbars. They set up checkpoints and patrolled these alleyways. After the protests, most neighborhood committees in Cairo dissolved.

Not in Imbaba.

Within days of Mubarak’s fall, neighbors started calling for Khaled’s group to do more. Somebody wanted them to train unemployed young people to direct traffic. Another wanted them to collect dues from each household and fund a garbage collection system.

Khaled’s neighbors’ attitudes towards their community had changed.

“The revolution was a big turning point,” Atef said. “Before the revolution, people here didn’t have a sense of belonging to the neighborhood because of what the old regime had done to them. But now, people here feel that this country belongs to them again. And they want to do something about it.”

In a country that has never had local government, the idea of neighbors organizing themselves to improve their community was, well, revolutionary. Since then, Khaled’s little committee has kicked into overdrive.

They’ve opened offices all over Imbaba. Established a modest budget and attracted a small army of 1,500 volunteers.

There are, Khaled says, Muslims and Christians represented on the committee. And, they’ve welcomed members of all political stripes.

They’ve organized soccer tournaments and street cleanups.

They’ve arranged to have gas lines and streetlights installed.

They’ve mediated disputes between rival businessmen.

Anyone listening to this outside of Egypt would think that these things would be the job of the government.

“We are the government,” Atef said. “There was a vacuum after the revolution and it was necessary to fill that because this is our country.”

The committee meets in an alleyway around the corner from Atef ‘s apartment. He takes his spot on a chair under a streetlight and greets committee members.

By 8:30, a dozen men have assembled on chairs borrowed wooden chairs from the coffee shop at the end of the alleyway. Atef reminds me that just months ago, attending a meeting like this might have landed us all in jail.

“In the days of the tyrant, somebody would have reported tonight’s meeting to the state security authorities,” Atef said. “And then, after 3 a.m., there would be a knock on he door and we’d all be taken away to jail. But you would be okay. Your embassy would come and bail you out.”

There’s not a hint of fear tonight, as Atef calls the meeting to order. There’s discussion about food prices, immunization and garbage.

We’ve been blocking the alleyway and cars want to pass. So the meeting adjourns briefly as committee members scatter. When they reconvene, Atef calls on Mr. Nasr to take the floor to report back from his trip to the local social security office.

“It’s so crowded and chaotic,” Nasr said. “There are big crowds and people have to wait in line for hours. And there are lots of arguments in line and with the clerks. Meanwhile, the manager just sits in his office and doesn’t care.”

Imbaba’s poorest residents collect food stamps each month at the chaotic social security.

“Men and women end up waiting in line from eight in the morning until three in the afternoon,” Nasr said. “And naturally, when they get to the clerk they are so fed up. The clerk is fed up too.”

It’s been that way for years – under Mubarak’s rule nothing could be done about it. But the neighborhood committee is about to demand changes.

“I went upstairs to meet the manager in his office. I told him that the least he could do is give out numbered tickets like they do in banks so people can sit and be comfortable until their number is called. The manager was cooperative. But his boss was arrogant, just like the old regime used to be. Of course, I kept my cool. I told him his arrogance would not go unnoticed and that we would file a complaint. I made sure to tell him that our voices will be heard,” Nasr said.

“That’s good,” Atef said. “It will give the message to the social security employees that we paid them respect and we didn’t go behind their backs and directly to the governor. Am I right? Ok. We will assemble a sub committee and it will go on Monday. Who wants to participate? Now, onto the next item. Public hygiene and cleaning.”

The meeting draws to a close just before midnight. Khaled and his friends want to know what I think about the neighborhood committee. I tell them that in the years I’ve been coming to Egypt I’ve heard complaints about just how difficult life has become here.

But I’ve never once heard anyone offer solutions. Until now. That’s exciting.

What I don’t tell them is that I wonder just how effective their neighborhood committee will be.