Enter the 'baltagiya': Egypt's repression spills out of the torture chambers
By Leela JACINTO (text)
For decades, Egyptian and international human rights groups have been
publishing reports of extensive torture in the world's largest Arab nation.
Grim, gruesome, and graphic, they do not make pleasant reading.
The reports of torture were so extensive and commonplace that apart from human
rights circles, little international attention was paid to these disturbing
chronicles.
On February 2 - or Day Nine of the Egyptian uprising all that suddenly
changed.
As protesters demanding the resignation of President Hosni Mubarak's clashed
with "baltagiya" - or hired thugs paid by the regime - the dark side of Egypt
was put on public display.
Under the international spotlight, the brutal repression of a 30-year-old
regime appeared to spill from the secrecy of the torture chambers onto the
streets of the Egyptian capital.
"This is the result of years of ignoring torture, of failing to prosecute it
and thereby deterring it," said Heba Morayef, a researcher with Human Rights
Watch in Cairo. "It has created a culture of impunity and this is coming out
into the streets."
A baroque blowback of an Arab Revolt gone wrong
As the world watched pro-and anti-Mubarak demonstrators battle it out on
Cairo's Tahrir Square international news organizations scrambled to make sense
of the seemingly senseless carnage.
First came the bizarre spectacle of regime supporters riding into Tahrir Square
on horses and camels in what seemed like a baroque blowback to a T.E.
Lawrence-era Arab Revolt gone wrong.
Then Arabic satellite stations such as Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya began
broadcasting images of anti-Mubarak demonstrators holding aloft what looked
like identity cards.
"Protesters show on camera police ID's they have seized from the attackers,"
read an Al Jazeera caption under one image.
(Photo: Al Jazeera screen-grab)
But Egyptian officials vehemently denied that plainclothes police had joined
the ranks of pro-regime demonstrators forcing international news organisations
to characterise the reports as "opposition claims".
Outsourcing coercion: Send in the `baltagiya'
Ordinary Egyptians had no such qualms about identifying the latest display face
of savagery.
"Baltagiya," was the one-word explanation used by many Egyptians including
those who preferred to give the regime a second chance so they could get back
to normal life.
An all-encompassing word that literally means "thugs" or "gangs" in Egyptian
Arabic, "baltagiya," according to Issandr El Amrani, a Cairo-based political
analyst and writer, "might be gangs, police informants, or unemployed youths
that can be hired, or just poor people who are paid off."
*
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During the three decades of Mubarak's rule, Egypt has acquired a vast security
establishment that El Amrani estimates employs nearly two million people
including police informants who have effectively formed a parallel force
defusing dissent at a local level.
Within the Egyptian security apparatus the "baltagiya" have been extensively
employed especially by the Interior Ministry's infamous SSI (State Security
Investigations).
In its latest report, "Work on Him Until He Confesses," the New York-based
Human Rights Watch has singled out SSI officials for using "torture and
ill-treatment on a widespread, deliberate and systematic basis over the past
two decades to glean confessions and information, or to punish detainees."
According to Human Rights Watch's Heba Morayef, the power of the SSI has been
increasing in recent years. "They monitor political parties, civil society
groups, anything political becomes an issue. Demonstrations are viewed as
illegal and illegitimate and protesters can be detained under the emergency
laws," she explained referring to the widely criticized legislation that has
been in place since the 1981 assassination of then President Anwar Sadat.
Over the last two decades of Mubarak's reign, the "baltagiya" have been accused
of violently breaking up demonstrations and using sexualized brutality such as
groping and harassment to deter protesters.
"This is not a new thing, it has been going on for ages," said El Amrani. "We
saw the"baltagiya" being used as a matter of routine during the November (2010
parliamentary) elections. The ruling NDP (National Democratic Party) used the
"baltagiya" for vote rigging and other activities, [while] big businessmen use
them for intimidation and racketeering. It's widespread."
Public anger over the endemic corruption, torture and savagery within the
police forces played a major role in sparking the latest, unprecedented
uprising in Egypt.
The face of the Egyptian uprising: `We are all Khaled Said'
The current protests broke out on January 25, a public holiday marking National
Police Day.
The timing, according to Morayef, was not coincidental. "The demonstrations
were planned and arranged for Police Day because of the public anger over the
killing of Khaled Said," she noted.
How Egyptians tweet, type, phone their story
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A 28-year resident of the Mediterranean coast city of Alexandria, Said was
pulled out of an Internet café in July 2010 by two plainclothes policemen and
bludgeoned to death at the entrance of the residential building, according to
several witnesses.
Opposition groups say Said was targeted for posting a video on the Internet of
police officers sharing the spoils from a drug bust. While the report has not
been confirmed, it seemed plausible for a populace that has long suspected
police of running drug and protection rackets with local gangs.
A Facebook page titled "We are all Khaled Said" set up by an anonymous human
rights activist who goes by the name of "al shaheed" ("the martyr") posted
mobile phone photographs of his battered corpse in the morgue.
It soon became a sizeable dissident Facebook page and when it joined other
protest movements in calling for protests on National Police Day, even the
organizers were surprised by the turnout.
Lifting the lid on a `brutalized society'
But they were not altogether surprised by what happened in the next few days.
In a London Review of Books column, El Amrani notes that on January 28, Egypt's
powerful former Interior Minister Habib al-Adly "decided to withdraw all police
from the centre of Cairo and let loose 'the baltagiya'
with orders to loot and
cause mayhem."
*
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The subsequent rioting forced many Cairo residents to set up neighbourhood
watch groups in the absence of law enforcement personnel on the streets.
As Egyptian state television channels unleashed a propaganda offensive accusing
opposition supporters and foreigners of "muamara" or "conspiracy" against
the nation, the stage was set for the brutal crackdown of Feb.2.
"Given the organized nature of the attacks by thugs (on opposition protesters),
they were very likely organized and carried out by people hired to do the job,"
said Morayef.
"The organized nature became even more apparent when the attacks stopped once
the Prime Minister (Ahmed Shafik) promised to investigate the incidents and
punish those responsible."
In a country where most torturers and thugs go unpunished few expect the
perpetrators of the February 2 clashes to face justice. And that, according to
some analysts, is a long term issue confronting Egyptian society.
"This is still a brutalized society," said El Amrani. "Cairo for outsiders
seemed like a safe place because society was heavily repressed. But when the
lid of repression is lifted, the brutal outcome is an outburst of violence."
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