Mideast: A leaderless people's power revolt

For our special presentation on Straight from the Sky, we bring you a current question: “What’s really happening in our Meat Industry?” Recent reports about contamination with home-made chorizo and the tug-o-war between meat importers and local meat dealers have exposed certain shortcomings in the way our meat industry is being managed.

 What is crystal clear is that there are only two abattoirs in Cebu that is accredited by the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) of the Department of Agriculture (DA which is quite alarming. Why our Local Government Units (LGU) can’t be compelled by the DA to be accredited or risk closure escapes me. Regardless of the problems between the meat exporters and importers, meat contamination is the result of unsanitary conditions in the handling of meat during processing, something that the LGUs should provide.

 To tell us what’s happening in the Meat Industry in Cebu we have with us Dr. Alvin Leal, Chief of Meat Import/Export Assistance Division of the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) and Meat Importer Mr. Jimmy Escaño of the Jesus Escaño Development Corp. (JEDCO). See this very interesting show on SkyCable’s Channel 15 at 8:00PM tonight.

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 The dramatic events happening in Egypt seen in CNN, BBC and all the TV news channels will no doubt have seismic implications in the Arab world. What’s happening there was triggered by the recent success in Tunisia when its 23-year-old authoritarian ruler Pres. Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali fled his country in a huff a couple of weeks ago after a month-long street protests for a self-imposed exile in Saudi Arabia.

 It was the first time ever that a sitting Arab leader was overthrown by a popular People’s Power Revolt. That incident sent a chilling message to other autocratic rulers in the Arab region. Soon, street demonstrations began in Sana, the Capital City of Yemen where hundreds of thousands of Yemenis trooped to the streets demanding the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down after a 32-year rule riddled with corruption. The political leadership enriched itself despite the fact that Yemen is one of the world’s impoverished nations even with an oil industry, though its reserves are diminishing.

 These two people uprisings have now spread to all the major cities in Egypt where more than 5 people have already died and hundreds injured. Egyptian Pres. Hosni Mubarak already went on nationwide TV asking his government to tender its resignation and come up with measures to come up with a government that can address the needs of the Egyptian people. But what the Egyptian people want is Pres. Mubarak to step down.

 What is totally strange in these people uprisings in Egypt, Yemen or in Tunisia is the fact that it is a leaderless revolution. Usually, there is a titular leader that an indignant angry mob would look up to who often gets arrested to quell the uprising. But there is none, hence it is difficult for the security apparatus in Egypt to arrest anyone in order to stop the uprising. So what the Egyptian authorities did was to stop all Internet and cellphone services. But it hasn’t stopped the mass actions in many cities in Egypt.

 How these street uprisings would end, perhaps we shall learn within the week. What is happening there is that the Egyptian people finally have had enough of the Egyptian type of Democracy, which is supported by the United States and Israel. Mubarak has been in power since the assassination of then Pres. Anwar Sadat in October 1981. Egypt has only seen three Presidents since 1970 when Pres. Gamal Abdel Nasser died and Sadat became President. After his assassination came Pres. Hosni Mubarak.

 Since Egypt lost its war with Israel in the 70’s Anwar Sadat recognized Israel with Prime Minister Menachem Begin, which earned him the ire of the Arab World and triggered his assassination. Pres. Hosni Mubarak who took over Sadat was propped up by the Americans through billions in military aid, which in turn kept him in power for decades. He was what we would say, “America’s son-of-a-bitch” just like then our own homegrown dictator Pres. Ferdinand E. Marcos was America’s son-of-a-bitch.

It is clear that America’s democratic principles allow for their puppets to remain in power at the expense of the development of their countries and their personal freedoms. Mubarak’s National Democratic Party (NDC) was at the heart of the anti-government protests because they really have a sham democracy in Egypt. US Pres. Barack Obama has already expressed his desire that the Egyptian government should allow a peaceful protest and chastised Egypt for stopping Internet and cellphone services. As of this writing, both the people are now hand-in-hand with the military in this protest, so you can say that it is just a matter of time until Pres. Mubarak would eventually step down.