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Following are excerpts from an interview with Egyptian geologist Farouq Al-Baz, which aired on Al-Hiwar TV on May 14 2009.
Farouq Al-Baz: The definition of “government” in our countries is the group that rules. In most other countries, the government is the group that serves society. The government is at the service of society, while here, the ruler controls everything in society. People’s notions must change. When you have to take care of something, and you go to a government office, the person there looks at your document and says: “Come back tomorrow or next week.” He has control over you. That should be his job. He gets paid to serve people.
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We don’t give people the opportunity to develop in science, industry, commerce, and so on. How come? Because since the days of the “glorious’ military revolutions in our countries, we have become used to saying “Yes, Sir” to the leaders, because they are military leaders.
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When someone – say, an engineer – goes to work in a small factory, and says to the manager: “Sir, it’s done this way here, but if we were to do it a different way...” The boss would say: “Get lost. You’re fresh out of college, and already you’re being a wise guy. We’ve been doing it this way for 20 years. Enough. How come you want to change how we do it?” This is a very dangerous thing, because you are silencing him.
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What the revolution did was to say that our entire ancient history is rubbish, and that we must rewrite history and create something new, in order to create a revolutionary generation. Every people in the world is built through historical accumulation. Our historical accumulation goes back 5,000 years. Egypt is a deeply-rooted country because it has a history. The roots of this history lie within us, in our notions, and the way we interact.
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In order to get a firm grip on the country, [the ruler] has to bring in all his friends and acquaintances, and appoint them [to various positions]. But who are these friends? They are all soldiers and officers... Somebody with no understanding of banking, for example, may be appointed president of a bank. Someone else may be appointed manager of a sugar factory, even though the guy doesn’t have a clue what a factory is – he was in the infantry or the artillery. He doesn’t know what this factory is, but he is appointed as the manager. Somebody else may be appointed Minister of Higher Education. Higher education?! He never set foot in a university, so how can this officer possibly be president of a university? And the list goes one. Complete unqualified people are appointed.
Interviewer: So the criteria are loyalty and trust, not skill and experience.
Farouq Al-Baz: Nothing else. This issue of appointing one’s trusted people is very dangerous. So what is actually happening here? Instead of loyalty to the homeland, to knowledge, and to Allah, there is loyalty to one’s superior. That’s it.
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