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 “I do have one regret, that on the 11th of February, we accepted to leave the square. Maybe we should have stayed.” - Salma el Tarzi, documentary maker and protester.

"Salma in the Square", broadcast in February, was one of Foreign Correspondent’s most memorable stories this year. As protesters occupied Tahrir Square in central Cairo, refusing to leave in the face of violence, threats and intimidation from the regime of Hosni Mubarak, we were there, following the drama through the eyes of a charismatic young rebel, Salma el Tarzi.

Like so many others, our crew was beaten by pro-government thugs and detained by military police. Protesters were shot, beaten and injured.

For eighteen long days and nights no-one knew whether the revolution would succeed. Eventually President Mubarak stepped down. The Egyptian Army stayed neutral; the people had triumphed, or so they thought.

Now we're back in Egypt to see what the revolution has delivered.

Despite military promises to supervise a quick transition to democracy, that hasn’t happened. Instead we’ve seen state-sponsored thuggery, the reimposition of censorship, and thousands of military trials where people convicted have no right of appeal.

Our crew was on hand on two occasions when Coptic Christians and Muslim allies clashed with military and police near the government television station.

In the second clash at least 27 people were killed and three injured. Foreign Correspondent was one of the few media teams able to enter the Coptic Hospital morgue where the dead, many of them squashed by armoured personnel carriers, had been brought.

“You know the army council is trying to kill the revolution.” - Bothaina Kamel, former newsreader and now presidential candidate

Amid the bloodshed and trouble there are signs of hope as well. Visit Tahrir Square and you’ll find a democratic nursery, full of passionate speakers and throbbing sound systems selling the merits of just some of Egypt’s fifty new political parties.

Bothaina Kamel and Salma el Tarzi are just two of many women who now have a voice and a more prominent role in the new Egypt. Kamel has begun campaigning for a presidential election which may be as far off as 2013.

And we meet Ghalia Mahmoud, formerly a humble housewife, now Egypt’s latest television sensation, with her own cooking show featuring local cuisine.

“The old regime did not want to show on TV that 90 per cent of the population eat this kind of food. They always had these high class programs, trying to show the rest of the world that Egyptians are always eating turkey, lamb, and lobster. They didn’t want to show the real Egypt.” - Ghalia Mahmoud, television chef

Nile. Setting sun

Music

00:00

KNIGHT:  On the right day, in the right light, Cairo looks serene.

00:13

Cairo

Music

00:18

KNIGHT:  The Nile is a timeless constant. So too it seems is the struggle for power. The revolution is far from over.

00:25

Tahrir Square

The rebellion gathered and grew nine months ago at a busy roundabout in the centre of Cairo. As the world knows well enough now, it’s a place called Tahrir Square. For 18 days and nights, Egyptians occupied the centre of the city.

00:39

Salma in square

SALMA EL TARZI:  For once I feel I belong somewhere..

KNIGHT:  Early on we met one of the revolution’s most impressive young leaders, Salma el Tarzi and followed her as the mood swung from day to day,

01:01

Mubarak footage on computer

hopes rising and falling that President Hosni Mubarak would give up power.

01:13

Tahrir Square

SALMA EL TARZI: [During February protest] “It’s overwhelming because there are so many emotions.

01:24

Salma

It’s so beautiful and so ugly at the same time, but there’s this feeling of pride. Everyone in this square is walking with their backs straight for the first time in their lives.

01:27

Tahrir Square

We are not animals. We have the right to be people and hold our heads high”.

01:41

Noor during February protest

NOOR AYMAN NOOR: “They’re trying to start a civil war between the Egyptians

KNIGHT: Noor Ayman Noor was also in Tahrir Square in February on the day the Mubarak regime paid thugs to attack pro-democracy demonstrators.

01:50

NOOR AYMAN NOOR:  They’re trying to get the Egyptians to kill each other. They sent their supporters with horses and camels so that we can be violent with us, so that we would  kill each other.

02:03

Celebrations at Square

02:12

KNIGHT: On the 11th of February, Hosni Mubarak finally stepped down.

02:15

Salma in Square

SALMA EL TARZI: [During February protest] “I think we’re going to celebrate for another couple of days”.

02:20

Celebrations at Square

KNIGHT: The Egyptian army took over promising it would manage a transition to democracy. The revolutionaries had won… or so they thought.

02:27

Salma at home making tea

Now Salma el Tarzi fears that the army has no intention of going back to the barracks.

SALMA EL TARZI: “It’s unfortunate that it has to be this ugly and that the army is forcing the situation that there

02:43

Salma. Super:
Salma el Tarzi
Democracy activist

should be so much bloodshed but if this is what it takes, then this is what it takes”.

02:57

YouTube footage. Soldiers beating protestors

KNIGHT: Every day, the Egyptian army is looking more and more like the regime it replaced.

03:08

Music

03:13

Police administer electric shocks

KNIGHT: This video posted on YouTube has provoked disgust. It’s hard to watch. It shows soldiers and police bashing and giving electric shocks to two men they accuse of selling weapons. This is the sort of brutality for which the Egyptian police were despised, methods which the army was thought not to practice.

03:15

Nile

NOOR AYMAN NOOR: “What breaks my heart is the fact that we all knew it would be a difficult road after Mubarak left.

03:44

Noor. Super:
Noor Ayman Noor
Democracy activist

I just never thought that we’d be oppressed in the exact same way by very similar people, using the exact same mechanisms”.

03:50

Noor walking with men

KNIGHT: Noor Ayman Noor is the son of a prominent Egyptian politician and bears the scars of being a revolutionary. Aged just twenty-one, all his energies go into resisting the military’s repression.

NOOR AYMAN NOOR: “People getting

04:05

Noor

beaten up, people getting killed, people getting arrested, people being placed on military trials. As well as again using the media to scare people, to give them the impression that okay the revolution is over, now it’s time to start building again”.

04:20

Military on street

SALMA EL TARZI: “They’re just not going to give it to us like this. I mean, let’s be realistic. These people were running the country for the past 60 years

04:37

Salma

and it would be very naive to expect that we tell them, okay we want a civil state, we don’t want you to have anything to do and then they just going to tell us, okay fine. Take it. I mean it wouldn’t make sense”.

04:45

Armed Forces Day. Military flyover/Brass bands/Ceremonial march

Music

04:58

KNIGHT: Each year Egypt marks the anniversary of the 1973 war with Israel as Armed Forces Day. The army has traditionally had the trust of the Egyptian people and that trust was strengthened back in February when soldiers came onto the street promising not to fire on protesters. It was the turning point of the revolution and it paved the way for the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, known as SCAF to take over – promising elections within six months.

05:03

Café 

The SCAF leader is Field Marshall Mohammed Tantawi

05:45

Tantawi on TV

who was Mubarak’s Defence Minister for 20 years and now fills the TV screens once dominated by the President.

05:49

Café

He claims progress towards democracy is being made, but many Egyptians have stopped listening.

BOTHAINA KAMEL: “You know the Army Council, the SCAF, trying to kill the revolution.

05:58

Bothaina. Super:
Bothaina Kamel
Presidential candidate

We went to the streets on the 25th of January against police and the torture and now we have police and army police. We have military trials. We have over than 12,000 Egyptians accused”.

06:17

Bothaina visits village

KNIGHT: Bothaina Kamel was a newsreader on Egyptian state television until she quit five years ago, saying she could no longer spruik the government’s propaganda. The revolution has given her a direction – she’s now running for president.

06:42

BOTHAINA KAMEL: “How to trust army? The mentality of the army is to give orders and to obey orders.

06:59

Bothaina

I believe that the army don’t want to give the power to a civil president. That’s what I believe”.

07:07

Journalists’ protest

07:20

KNIGHT: When the military council SCAF announced last month it was bringing back censorship laws, journalists were furious. In recent months reporters have been harassed and arrested. Newspapers have been closed and at Egyptian State Television, very little has changed,

07:30

Bothaina on talk show

as Bothaina Kamel discovered when she appeared on a talk show.

07:50

BOTHAINA KAMEL: [Egyptian talk show] “My program is the revolution’s demands – bread, freedom and dignity. My slogan is ‘Egypt is my agenda’.”

KNIGHT: State TV management weren’t impressed. The presenter was told to kill the interview.

07:55

SHOW PRESENTER: “Actually, I’m being forced to end the program now. The producer in the control room has had calls from Dr Sami el-Sherif, head of the Egyptian television union, ordering us to end this program now.

BOTHAINA KAMEL: “This is worse than Mubarak’s media”.

KNIGHT: Two days later the army called.

08:12

BOTHAINA KAMEL: “They charged me with insulting a member of the army council and insulting

08:30

Bothaina

the army but I said, ‘I respect very much the Egyptian Army but me and all the Egyptians have the right to criticise the army council and his politics’.

08:35

They can’t accept criticising them, but why we need a revolution?”

08:57

Shoubra district

KNIGHT: In the working class area of Shoubra, many people are asking the same question.

“So you’re saying that

09:05

Knight on balcony with Dr Sadaawi

the mosques have got louder in recent times?”

DR NAWAL SADAAWI: “Yes. And even after the revolution of course they started under Sadat. We never had that before”.

09:12

KNIGHT: Dr Nawal Sadaawi is one of Egypt’s most famous authors and activists and another veteran of Tahrir Square.

09:23

DR NAWAL SADAAWI: “We have a backlash.

09:33

Dr Sadaawi. Super:
Dr. Nawal Sadaawi
Writer

We have a backlash against the revolution, against women, against secularism, against equality, against democracy”.

09:35

Cityscape

KNIGHT: This is the problem. Everyone in Egypt has their own idea about what their revolution was about.

“Do you trust the army to steer Egypt towards democracy?”

DR NAWAL SADAAWI: “No. Two things I don’t trust. Military rule and religious rule.

09:44

Dr Sadaawi

We must have a secular civil government”.

KNIGHT: “And what if you don’t get it?

DR NAWAL SADAAWI: “We fight for it. Nobody dreamt, I am a very, I am a woman of struggle, of confrontation you know? I am a fighter, not only a writer, so I struggle for everything – in my private life and in my public life – so we never dreamt that Mubarak would leave”.

10:02

Bread seller on street/Military flyover

KNIGHT: The revolution was not just a reaction to the excesses of the regime, it was also driven by the fundamentals of life.

GHALIA:  Has the war started, or what?

10:28

Ghalia shopping in market

Ghalia Mahmoud is in many ways fairly typical of Egypt’s massive working class.

10:42

“So the poverty, was that why you supported the revolution

10:48

Ghalia

or was there another reason?”

GHALIA MAHMOUD: “Of course. The revolution grew out of poverty and hunger – that’s the main reason behind it. Some people had too much, while others were hungry. That was the reason for the revolution – social justice”.

10:52

Ghalia shopping in market

KNIGHT: “So Ghalia what’s your weekly food budget for your family?”

11:09

GHALIA MAHMOUD: “No more than 100 Egyptian pounds for the whole week”.

11:15

KNIGHT: “So for about 15 American dollars a week you’re feeding a family of ten,

11:21

Ghalia

so what do they eat for that much money?”

GHALIA MAHMOUD: “Once a week I’ll feed them chicken or meat. The rest of the week is all vegetables with rice”.

11:25

TV lights

Music

11:34

Ghalia in studio

KNIGHT: While Ghalia still skimps on the household budget, the revolution has given her a chance to show other Egyptians what they can do.

11:38

GHALIA MAHMOUD: [on her TV show] “Welcome my friends – and today is a new and delightful day”.

KNIGHT: It’s changed her life in ways she could never have expected.

11:47

Ghalia Mahmoud is Egypt’s newest celebrity chef.

11:58

GHALIA MAHMOUD: “Today we’re going to cook breaded marrows in olive oil with marrows and tomatoes. It’s a beautiful dish – you will enjoy it”.

12:02

KNIGHT: There’s never been a show like this on Egyptian television and not just because Hosni Mubarak’s wife Suzanne banned women in headscarves from appearing on screen.

12:15

GHALIA MAHMOUD: “The old regime did not want to show on TV that 90 per cent of the population cook this kind of food.

12:27

Ghalia interview

They always had these high-class programs trying to show the rest of the world that Egyptians are always eating turkey, lamb and lobster. They didn’t want to show the real Egypt”.

12:34

Mohamed Gohar in studio control room

KNIGHT: Ghalia Mahmoud was discovered while she was working as a cook for the sister of TV producer Mohamed Gohar. He knew she’d be perfect for his new station, called “25” after the January 25th revolution. Channel 25 broadcasts

12:49

State TV building/Protest

from a studio in the shadow of the massive state television building. As we left it that night, we walked straight into demonstrators who were targeting that TV centre, known as the Maspiro.

13:1208

Coptic Christians were demanding that the army keep its promise to protect all Egyptians. Since the revolution, they’ve come under increasing attack from Muslim extremists.

“What does the Egyptian revolution mean to Coptic Christians?

13:29

Mohamed Atef at protest

MOHAMED ATEF: “The Egyptian revolution meant for all Egyptians, freedom. But unfortunately the freedom didn’t reach us until now. Until now we didn’t get it. I am Muslim but I am talking in the same tongue as my Coptic brothers. The Egyptian revolution didn’t protect them, didn’t protect their freedom to religion”.

13:53

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14:15

Street rally.

KNIGHT: Four nights later we’re back near the government television centre again watching a much bigger rally by Christians and some of their Muslim allies. Initially they’re attacked by thugs. Then, there are running street battles with riot police and soldiers. State TV inflames the situation telling its viewers the army is coming under attack from Christians and that people should come onto the streets to help the soldiers.

14:25

We heard gunshots, riot police fired tear gas and charge with batons raised. We’re chased across a bridge spanning the Nile. State TV reports that three soldiers have been killed but it says nothing about any other casualties. 

14:59

Coptic Hospital morgue

At Cairo’s Coptic Hospital we find them. Chaos reigns in the morgue. People are keen to show us the victims.

15:25

Bodies

There’s only room for three bodies in the refrigerated section. The bodies of 14 others are laid on the floor. Their faces uncovered for their families to identify them. This is not the first time that I’ve been in a morgue but it would have to be the most distressing.

15:43

Instead of casualties of war, these are casualties of something else. Along with the bullet wounds, faces have been caved in.

16:03

Man screaming

Grief turns to anger, especially when outside the walls the Egyptian Army arrives.

16:13

Outside hospital

This hospital is four or five kilometres away from where the riots and protests took place, but there are running battles outside in the street outside it. We can’t leave. No one in here can leave.

16:21

Inside hospital

PAULUS ZAKI: “We are Christian. We come for the peace. We only came to Maspiro and we told them we’d finish about 8 o’clock”.

16:39

Paulus Zaki

KNIGHT: “They said that you set fire to the police vehicles, that police officers were killed”.

PAULUS ZAKI: “Yes police officers and the army, the Egyptian Army. I cannot believe the Egyptian Army has killed Egyptian people. Whatever nationality we are, we are Egyptian. We cannot believe that. How can you do this to people, why?”

16:47

Outside hospital/Injured inside hospital

KNIGHT: At least 27 people were killed and 300 wounded in the worst episode of violence since the revolution.

17:16

SCAF media conference

SCAF called a media conference to defend itself against accusations of murder.

17:28

ARMY PERSONNEL: “The Armed Forces would never direct its fire at the people”.

17:37

KNIGHT: “The army claims soldiers didn’t use live ammunition and didn’t deliberately run over anyone. It blames the deaths on unnamed infiltrators trying to destroy the revolution”.

17:44

SALMA EL TARZI: “And they always use big words like, ‘foreign conspiracy’, ‘mysterious powers’, ‘powers of darkness’ and this is not a joke. One of the statements said ‘the mysterious powers of darkness’. It was like Darth Vader is invading Cairo.

18:00

Salma. Super:
Salma el Tarzi
Democracy activist

They never tell you who this is but they always keep it vague and they always make you feel that there is this huge conspiracy against Egypt and it’s everyone’s duty to really protect it and the only way to protect it is to kill the people that are demonstrating in the street”.

18:15

YOUTUBE – channel 25 live shot with sounds of screaming studio staff

KNIGHT: On the night of the Coptic protest, Channel 25 shows pictures of the melee outside its windows. Suddenly, armed soldiers burst into its studio… [woman screaming]… The pregnant news presenter is terrified. A Christian staffer is beaten up.

18:31

Ghalia’s program

Channel 25 protests against the army raid and shuts down. Ghalia Mahmoud’s new career looks short lived. But in the past week, both Channel 25 and Ghalia are back on the air.

19:00

Sunflower/Nile valley village

Music

19:21

Many other Egyptians are also finding that the revolution isn’t delivering change. The economy is paralysed. Half the population lives on less than two dollars a day.

19:33

Even in the fertile Nile Valley, farmers can only afford to lease tiny plots of land. They’re desperately poor.

19:48

Kafr Hemayed

In the village of Kafr Hemayed there’s no sanitation and very little running water and electricity. It has only a junior school and as many as eighty-five students are crammed into each classroom.

20:00

“This village is believed to be the poorest in the governorate of Giza, although figures are almost impossible to come by. But it’s exactly the sort of place which was ignored and taken for granted by the ruling party. No politician of any consequence ever came here and certainly no one ever felt the need to campaign here, but tonight that’s going to change”.

20:19

Bothaina visits village

Bothaina Kamel wants to be president to improve villagers’ lives, yet she’s asking some difficult questions of potential voters.

20:48

Bothaina talks with villagers

BOTHAINA KAMEL: “Do you believe in equality, meaning that the rich and the poor are equal and that we’re all equal? We must believe that this is the principle we must fight for – that no Muslim is better than a Christian. And when we educate, we educate the boy and the girl”.

20:57

Bothaina at wedding party

KNIGHT: She crashes a wedding party, but no one seems to mind. Her TV profile probably helps. Most people just seem stunned that someone like her is actually paying attention to them.

21:22

Bothaina at meeting in mayor’s house

At the mayor’s house, village leaders are pouring out their problems. Bothaina Kamel asks them to swear a pledge.

BOTHAINA KAMEL: [village leaders repeat after her] “I swear by the Almighty God I will not go back to my old ways, being a passive citizen. And that I will not let anyone steal my rights and my homeland’s rights and my children’s rights”.

21:44

Cairo traffic

22:18

Tahrir Square

KNIGHT: One positive effect of the February revolution has been the emergence of grass roots political debate in Egypt. There are now more than 50 new political parties - and in Tahrir Square come most Fridays, each sets up its own stage and PA system, each trying to drown out the others with ear splitting speeches.

22:26

The first round of parliamentary elections is due at the end of the month, but even now after nine months in charge, SCAF issues contradictory instructions about how those elections will be conducted. The pro democracy campaigners have no confidence in them.

NOOR AYMAN NOOR: “We’re going to see lots of bloodshed during these elections so that the army can come back and say,

23:00

Noor. Super:
Noor Ayman Noor
Democracy activist

look we said it before; the Egyptian people aren’t ready enough for democracy, there’s going to be a mini-military takeover, we’re going to take things over until things are stable again and then we’ll open things up for democracy later”.

23:25

Salma celebrating in square. February

Music

23:34

KNIGHT: 18 days of defying the Mubarak regime dramatically changed Salma el Tarzi’s life

23:45

Salma at home

and while maintaining the rage still dominates her life, she is getting back to work making documentaries. It’s not easy finding the balance.

23:55

SALMA EL TARZI: “I do not expect the revolution to be over soon.

24:05

Salma

We are cleaning up the mess of the past, not only 30 years, I believe the past 60 years and it’s not going to happen in nine months”.

24:09

Coptic funeral

COPTIC GROUP CHANTING: “With our spirit, with our blood we sacrifice for the Cross. With our spirit, with our blood we sacrifice for the Cross”.

24:18

KNIGHT: When the Coptic community buried their dead, they called them martyrs. It’s an overused word in the Middle East, but it’s still highly loaded. As each coffin arrives, waves of emotion rip through the cathedral. For some the anguish is too much to bear.

24:30

Bothaina at funeral

Respect for human rights was a key demand for pro democracy campaigners. While the army initially seemed to understand this, the slaughter of Egyptian Christians has triggered the biggest crisis in the country since the revolution.

24:58

Coffins being carried

The military council intends to hold onto power until the Constitution is rewritten and a presidential election is held. That could be as late as 2013 – far too long for an impatient, angry people.

25:16

25:32

Reporter: Ben Knight

Camera: Geoffrey Lye

Editor: Simon Brynjolffssen

Research: Youssef Taha

Producer: Greg Wilesmith

25:46