Gamal Abdel Nasser
There is no longer a way out of our present situation except by forging a road toward our objective, violently and by force, over a sea of blood and under a horizon blazing with fire.
Gamal Abdel Nasser was the second president of Egypt, serving from 1956 until his death in 1970. His calls for pan-Arab unity culminated in the short lived United Arab Republic with Syria between 1958 and 1961. His leadership saw a series of socialist measures and modernization reforms in Egypt. Many people considered him the president of the poor. Before Nasser, if you were poor, you and your family remained poor forever. With no access to education or land ownership and abhorrent exploitation of labor, moving up social classes was nearly impossible.
Nasser’s government introduced far reaching social initiatives such as free education and free health care. Women were accorded more rights, including the right to vote. His administration brought large scale industrialization including the construction of the Aswan Dam. A new middle class began to occupy positions of power that were once held by Italians, Greeks, French, Britons, and other foreigners whom Nasser encouraged — sometimes by force — to leave Egypt.
Prior to 1952, less than 6% of Egypt’s population owned more than 65% of the land. This land owning class had almost autocratic rule of the country. To remedy this, Nasser’s administration introduced sweeping land reforms that limited land ownership and gave land that had been owned by plutocrats back to Egyptian farmers. His administration instituted minimum wages for agricultural workers and helped establish cooperative farming initiatives for farmers who did not own a lot of land. Nasser’s land reform programs saw land move back to everyday Egyptians, as opposed to Mugabe’s land reform programs that saw land move to the political elite of Zimbabwe. Unlike Zimbabwe, the farms continued to function, providing food for millions of Egyptians.
In 1956 the US and Britain agreed to loan Egypt capital to finance the Aswan High Dam project. When both countries defaulted on their promise within days of each other, Nasser announced that he would be nationalizing the Suez Canal and taxing its usage to help build the dam. At the same time, Egypt-Israel relations had grown very tense since the First Arab Israeli War. Britain and France thus conspired with Israel to attack Nasser for control of the canal in October 1956. The US administration, under Eisenhower, and the United Nations all condemned the tripartite invasion. In the end, all three nations withdrew their troops in late 1956 and early 1957. Nasser’s reputation was enhanced by what was perceived as a failed invasion and an attempt to topple his government.
There was a saying that the Arab world used to stop life on two events, both coming from Egypt: Umm Kalthum singing on the first Friday of the month, and Abdel Nasser making a speech. He remains one of the most popular leaders of the Arab world. His funeral was one of the biggest funerals in modern Arab history; drawing five million mourners to Cairo.
On the other hand, Nasser left a repressive government that people argue allowed leaders like Muammar Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein and Hosni Mubarak to come into power. His government imprisoned thousands of political dissidents and herded many into concentration camps in the desert. He introduced torture culture in policing and prisons. In many ways Egypt became a police state; mail was opened, media was censored, key newspapers were nationalized, telephones were tapped and visitors rooms were searched.
Despite his stern governance and some of his losses at war, he remains an iconic figure in the Arab world for his social reform, Arab nationalism and anti-imperialist efforts.
