How to Hate Each Other Peacefully in a Democracy

It is difficult to imagine it now, but continental Europe struggled with foundational divides—with periodic warnings of civil war—as recently as the 1950s. Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, and the Netherlands were divided into ideologically opposed subcultures, sometimes called “spiritual families” or “pillars.” These countries became models of “consensual democracy,” where the subcultures agreed to share power through creative political arrangements.

If we have learned anything, though, it is that lessons learned in Europe are not easily applied to the Middle East. Consensual democracy works best when there are multiple centers of power in society, none of which is strong enough to dominate on its own. While this more or less holds true in Lebanon, and even then precariously, it is not applicable in much of the region. In countries like Egypt, Turkey, and to a lesser extent Tunisia, the perception that Islamists are too strong and secularists too weak makes polarization significantly worse than it might otherwise be.

In continental Europe, the lines were also drawn more clearly. In Belgium, for instance, there were distinct groups of Flemish and Walloon that could be plainly identified. Egypt, Turkey, and Tunisia, however, relatively homogenous. More homogeneity is almost always viewed as a positive factor in forging national identity, but it can also have its drawbacks. Islamists and non-Islamists are different, but not different enough.

They live in the same cities, go to the same schools, visit each other on holidays, and sit together at family dinners. This can make it better. It can also make it worse.
Despite this surface-level homogeneity, the underlying principles of consensual democracy—that power should be shared, dispersed, and restrained—can still be useful. A “pure” parliamentary system with only a ceremonial president could have helped alter Egypt’s course. But this is not what Egypt had. From independence onwards, the Egyptian president had always been a towering figure in the country’s politics, casting a shadow on everything else. As the first elected, civilian president in 2012, Morsi was, in fact, weaker than all of his predecessors, yet he still enjoyed disproportionate powers in Egypt’s centralized, top-heavy system. Not surprisingly, then, he became a lightning rod for the opposition. The fact that presidential contests are all or nothing—only one person, after all, can win –heightened the existential tenor of political competition. These dynamics allowed the military to capitalize on the anger that had coalesced around the person of President Morsi.

A parliamentary system, on the other hand, would have put power in the hands of a strong prime minister, who could have more easily been replaced, without necessitating a rejection of the democratic process Egyptians had agreed to less than a year prior. Early elections and no-confidence votes are regular features of parliamentary democracy. Presidents, on the other hand, are generally difficult to impeach, requiring voters to wait four years or longer to express their buyers’ remorse. Despite their claims to the contrary, presidents invariably represent one party—their own. A prime minister is more likely to govern in coalition with other parties, making him accountable to a larger number of stakeholders. All other things being equal, parliamentary systems also make coups against elected leaders less likely. Of course, coups can and will still happen, but here, too, parliamentarism is the better option. Ousted parties can more easily reconstitute themselves in parliamentary systems, as Turkey’s recurring cycle of military intervention followed by Islamist success suggests.

“Designing” better political systems can only take you so far, however. At some point, parties and politicians must work in good faith to lower the political stakes. There are any number of creative possibilities. Parties, for example, can agree to “postpone” debates on the divisive issues that are likely to fracture the unsteady, diverse coalitions that toppled the authoritarian regimes in the first place. This, though, is anathema to how we like to think about democracy’s development. After 30 years of Hosni Mubarak’s rule, it was only natural to expect Egyptians to want to debate anything and everything among themselves; discussions over the role of religion had been suppressed for far too long.

But by instituting an “interim period” before contending with the most divisive issues, democratic competition can be regularized—both sides could, potentially, gain enough trust in each other. Of course, the ideological polarization—over perennial touchstones like alcohol consumption, sex segregation, women’s rights, and educational curricula—would still inevitably come. At least then, though, Egyptians would have had a fighting chance.
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One way to address foundational divides is to build “liberal vetoes” into the political system from the beginning. The most effective way to do this is through permanent guarantees in the constitution. The U.S. Bill of Rights is, in this respect, a towering achievement, imposing clear limits on the desires of the majority. If members of Congress wanted to issue legislation prohibiting Muslims from holding cabinet positions, for instance, they wouldn’t be able to, however large their majority. The constitution wouldn’t allow it. But this raises its own set of difficult questions. After a revolution, who gets to write the constitution?

There are two main possibilities. Historically, elite commissions and committees often drafted constitutions, the most notable example being the United States in 1787. The post-war Japanese constitution, meanwhile, was commissioned by General Douglas MacArthur and drafted by “approximately two dozen Americans during Japan’s postwar occupation, with relatively minor revisions made by Japanese government officials and virtually no public consultation,” writes the legal scholar Alicia Bannon. When Corazon Aquino, Asia’s first female president, led the Philippines’ democratic transition in the 1980s, she appointed a fifty-member commission which drafted a constitution that continues to govern the Philippines to this day. Such top-down approaches have generally fallen out of favor.

Today, the most common approach, adopted by both Tunisia and Egypt in 2011, is to do it democratically. Tunisia directly elected a parliament which doubled as a constituent assembly, while in Egypt, the elected parliament selected the 100 men and women whose sole job was to draft a new constitution. This is the most obvious—and I would argue fair—approach. To the extent that societies should be able to chart their own course, why shouldn’t the population have a say on the basic framework of their political system-to-be? To shut ordinary citizens out is to undermine the legitimacy of any constitutional document, particularly in polarized societies where one group is likely to dominate any appointed body to the exclusion of others. There is simply no way to achieve “fair” representation except through some kind of democratic selection process (which is precisely why we have democracy in the first place). To appoint, rather than elect, a committee also raises the question of who exactly is doing the appointing.

Tunisia and Egypt’s constitution-drafting processes were reflective of the international consensus around the need for popular participation and buy-in. The democratic approach to constitution-drafting, however, is problematic for the same reasons that democracy is problematic—it can lead to illiberal outcomes in societies where a large portion, perhaps even a majority, of the population espouse illiberal beliefs and attitudes. If Egypt had directly elected its constituent assembly, close to 75 percent of the members would have been Islamist. As it turned out, 50 percent were—nearly 25 percent less than their actual electoral weight would have suggested. But while Islamists may have seen this as a “concession,” liberals, rightly, saw the constituent assembly as what it still was: an Islamist-dominated body.

In her study of Kenya’s early-2000s constitution drafting process, Alicia Bannon labels the presumed need for broad participation “the participation myth.” Certain conditions, she argues, can “make broad participation either helpful or undesirable in light of an individual country’s circumstances.” While also citing negative experiences in Nicaragua and Chad, Bannon notes that the broadly participatory process in Kenya was not only expensive, in terms of “expense, time, and opportunity cost,” but also divisive, leading to “ethnic pandering and polarization.”

Lastly, instituting a democratic selection process while, at the same time, agreeing on a limited number of “supraconstitutional principles” is a third, alternative path. Islamists and secularists, however, are unlikely to agree on nonnegotiables. (If they could, then the ideological divide wouldn’t be nearly as large as it is.) In the end, something—or someone—has to give. Either Islamists voluntarily concede some of their preferences, agreeing for example to include only mildly Islamic language, or a supreme body, perhaps one where Islamists are underrepresented, formulates something resembling a “bill of rights” binding on all participants.

This third way would loosely mirror the constitution-drafting process in post-apartheid South Africa. Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress initially wanted to elect a constituent assembly to draft the constitution but gave in to the objections of F.W. de Klerk’s National Party, which feared a new constitution would not adequately protect the white population. In 1993, 26 parties negotiated a set of supra-constitutional principles, similar to the United States’ Bill of Rights, before directly electing a constituent assembly. Mandela and de Klerk soon shared the Nobel Peace Prize.


Practicality aside, the South African model—in part because we know, after the fact, that it was successful—sounds appealing. I should include a major caveat here, however. As a “small-d” democrat, I am deeply uncomfortable with non-democratic solutions that circumscribe self-determination. Democracy is about representing and reflecting the popular will, and to limit or subvert that on something as fundamental as a constitution sets a troubling precedent. Why shouldn’t Egyptians, Jordanians, or Turks have the right to try out an alternative ideological project outside the confines of liberal democracy, however much we might disagree with it? That should be their choice, not anyone else’s. That conversation, however, is moot if democracy fails to take hold in the first place. A democratic approach to constitution drafting in Egypt ended up fueling polarization and pushed liberals to consider—and then support—extra-legal regime change. If we wish to prioritize the survival of democracy in hostile conditions, then some things, at least in the short run, will need to be prioritized over others. These are necessary evils. - The Atlantic 

'Where is the Bride?' Donald Trump Becomes Real-Life Wedding Crasher

President Trump became the crasher in chief over the weekend when he surprised a couple celebrating their wedding at his New Jersey country club.

Kristen and Tucker Gladhill were surprised when Donald Trump made a surprise appearance at their Bedminster wedding reception.
“It has been a magical, monumental weekend for us,” the groom told Inside Edition.

Kristen was in the ladies room when guests started chanting “U-S-A!” The president, who was spending the weekend at the club with the first family, was heard repeatedly asking, “Where is the bride?”

“I was in the bathroom when I heard the load roar,” she said. I realized I had to hurry up and get out there and my hands were still soaking wet from washing them. Everyone was like ‘Where is the bride? Where is the bride?’ I came out and snuck out from behind him.”

Kristen and Tucker had begun planning their wedding two years before Trump was elected president.
“He shook my hand, he looked at my wife, he looked at me and he said, ‘Well done!'" Tucker added.

From "caliph" to fugitive: IS leader Baghdadi's new life on the run

Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is on the brink of losing the two main centres of his 'caliphate' but even though he is on the run, it may take years to capture or kill him, officials and experts said.

Islamic State fighters are close to defeat in the twin capitals of the group's territory, Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria, and officials say Baghdadi is steering clear of both, hiding in thousands of square miles of desert between the two.

"In the end, he will either be killed or captured, he will not be able to remain underground forever," said Lahur Talabany, the head of counter-terrorism at the Kurdistan Regional Government, the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq. "But this is a few years away still," he told Reuters .

One of Baghdadi's main concerns is to ensure those around him do not betray him for the $25 million reward offered by the United States to bring him "to justice", said Hisham al-Hashimi, who advises Middle East governments on Islamic State affairs.

"With no land to rule openly, he can no longer claim the title caliph," Hashimi said. "He is a man on the run and the number of his supporters is shrinking as they lose territory."
Iraqi forces have retaken much of Mosul, the northern Iraqi city the hardline group seized in June 2014 and from which Baghdadi declared himself "caliph" or leader of all Muslims shortly afterwards. Raqqa, his capital in Syria, is nearly surrounded by a coalition of Syrian Kurdish and Arab groups.

The last public video footage of him shows him dressed in black clerical robes declaring his caliphate from the pulpit of Mosul's medieval Grand al-Nuri mosque back in 2014.
Born Ibrahim al-Samarrai, Baghdadi is a 46-year-old Iraqi who broke away from al-Qaeda in 2013, two years after the capture and killing of the group's leader Osama bin Laden.

He grew up in a religious family, studied Islamic Theology in Baghdad and joined the Salaafi jihadist insurgency in 2003, the year of the US-led invasion of Iraq. He was caught by the Americans who released him about a year later as they considered him then as a civilian rather than a military target.

BOUNTY

He is shy and reserved, Hashimi said, and has recently stuck to the sparsely populated Iraq-Syria border where drones and strangers are easy to spot.
The U.S. Department of State's Counter-Terrorism Rewards Program had put the same $25 million bounty on Bin Laden and Iraqi former president Saddam Hussein and the reward is still available for Bin Laden's successor, Ayman al-Zawahiri.
Neither Saddam nor Bin Laden were voluntarily betrayed, but the bounties complicated their movements and communications.

"The reward creates worry and tension, it restricts his movements and limit the number of his guards," said Fadhel Abu Ragheef, a Baghdad-based expert on extremist groups. "He doesn't stay more than 72 hours in any one place."

Baghdadi "has become nervous and very careful in his movements", said Talabany, whose services are directly involved in countering Islamic State   plots. "His circle of trust has become even smaller."
His last recorded speech was issued in early November, two weeks after the start of the Mosul battle, when he urged his followers to fight the "unbelievers" and "make their blood flow as rivers".

U.S. and Iraqi officials believe he has left operational commanders behind with diehard followers to fight the battles of Mosul and Raqqa, to focus on his own survival.
It is not possible to confirm his whereabouts.
Baghdadi does not use phones and has a handful of approved couriers to communicate with his two main aides, Iyad al-Obaidi, his defence minister, and Ayad al-Jumaili, in charge of security. There was no confirmation of an April 1 Iraqi state TV report that Jumaili had been killed.

Baghdadi moves in ordinary cars, or the kind of pick-up trucks used by farmers, between hideouts on both sides of the Iraqi-Syrian border, with just a driver and two bodyguards, said Hashimi.
The region is well known to his men as the hotbed of the Sunni insurgency against U.S. forces that invaded Iraq and later the Shi'ite-led governments that took over the country.

At the height of its power two years ago, Islamic State ruled over millions of people in territory running from northern Syria through towns and villages along the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys to the outskirts of the Iraqi capital Baghdad.
It persecuted non-Sunnis and even Sunnis who did not agree with its extreme version of Islamic law, with public executions and whippings for violating strict controls on appearance, behaviour and movement.

But the group has been retreating since in the face of a multitude of local, regional and international forces, driven into action by the scores of deadly attacks around the world that it has claimed or inspired.

A few hundred thousand people now live in the areas under the group's control, in and around Raqqa and Deir al-Zor, in Syria's east, and in a few pockets south and west of Mosul. Hashimi said Islamic State was moving some fighters out of Raqqa before it was encircled to regroup in Deir al-Zor.

Mosul, with pre-war population of 2 million, was at least four times the size of any other the group has held. Up to 200,000 people are still trapped in the Old City, Islamic State's besieged enclave in Mosul, lacking supplies and being used as human shields to obstruct the progress of Iraqi forces by a U.S-led international coalition.

The Syrian Democratic Forces, made of Kurdish and Arab groups supported by the U.S.-led coalition, began to attack Raqqa last week, after a months-long campaign to cut it off.
The militants are also fighting Russian and Iranian-backed forces in Syria loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, and mainly Sunni Muslim Syrian rebels backed by Turkey.

The last official report about Baghdadi was from the Iraqi military on Feb. 13. Iraqi F-16s carried out a strike on a house where he was thought to be meeting other commanders, in western Iraq, near the Syrian border, it said.
Overall, Islamic State has 8,000 fighters left, of which 2,000 are foreigners from other Arab states, Europe, Russia and central Asia, said Abu Ragheef.

"A small number compared to the tens of thousands arrayed against them in both countries, but a force to be reckoned with, made up of die-hards with nothing to lose, hiding in the middle of civilians and making extensive use of booby traps, mines and explosives," he said.

The U.S. government has a joint task force to track down Baghdadi which includes special operations forces, the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies as well as spy satellites of the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency.

It will take more than that to erase his influence, Talabany said. "He is still considered the leader of ISIL and many continue to fight for him; that hasn't changed drastically," he said, using one of Islamic State's acronyms.
Even if killed or captured, he added, "his legacy and that of ISIL will endure unless radical extremism is tackled."

Pastor Forgives Thief Who Broke Into Church Office to Steal (Photos)

A burglar who was caught breaking into a church in Nigeria to steal a plasma TV and other items. He was initially handed over to the police before being bailed by the pastor.

 

The young man who was reportedly lured into the game of thievery by some hoodlums he met while selling sausage rolls known as Gala. He reportedly gave his life to Jesus Christ and was prayed for as he starts a new life.

 

Prophet Mezziah Mrakpor who heads the church confirmed that the broken young man who shed tears publicly as he narrated his story has been financially empowered by him.

 

See more photos below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Badoo Members Break Pastor’s Head With Mortar

A minister with the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries, Wale Solomon, is battling for his life in an undisclosed hospital on the Lagos Island after he was allegedly attacked by some cult members suspected to be Badoo.

Punch Metro gathered that the father of three was sleeping with his family in their house on Obayemi Street, First Gate, Ikorodu, when the hoodlums stormed the house around 2am on Saturday. The men were said to have smashed the mortar on the victim’s head and injured him in different parts of his body.

His wife was reportedly aroused from sleep by the cry of pain of the husband as she ran out of the house to call for help. Some neighbours reportedly ran to the house and found the victim in a pool of blood, with the mortar by his side. They were said to have alerted policemen from the Sagamu Road Division.

Anthony was rushed to the Ikorodu General Hospital, from where he was taken to the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ikeja, and was further referred to the undisclosed hospital.

A resident, Bola Odunsi, said the incident threw the community into commotion.

She said, “They invaded First Gate on Saturday and entered the man’s house while he was asleep with his wife and kids. They came with a big mortar, which they used to smash the man’s head.

“The noise woke up the wife and on sensing danger, she rushed out and called for help. People came out and saw the man bleeding from different parts of his body. They rushed him to a private hospital in the area from where he was referred to General Hospital, Ikorodu.”

Punch Metro learnt that policemen from the Sagamu Road Division, who were alerted by residents, arrived in the area later, but could not find any of the culprits.

A woman, who lived close to the victim’s house, told Punch correspondent that Solomon was responding to treatment at the hospital where he was taken to.

He said, “He was transferred from the General Hospital, Ikorodu, to LASUTH and from there, he was taken to a specialist hospital on the Lagos Island. I was told he still bleeds from the nose and ears. But the family is hopeful that God will take control.”

Another resident said the pastor’s house was prone to attack because it was uncompleted and without a fence.

“The house is an uncompleted building; he lives there alone with his wife and children. The man has been trying to finish the building, but he appeared not to have the funds.

“I think the family was lucky that the woman ran out to call for help on time, because Badoo members always wipe out the household they attack. They left behind the mortar that they used to break the man’s head,” she added.

Punch Metro gathered that a suspected member of the gang was caught on Sunday by some residents.

The suspect was reportedly beaten to a pulp and was about to be lynched when a traditional ruler in the community intervened and begged that he be handed over to the police.

However, some members of a vigilance group, known as Onyabo, reportedly took the suspect away to an unknown place.

The state Police Public Relations Officer, Olarinde Famous-Cole, confirmed the attack, saying the command was investigating the case.

IG Approves Post-Humous Promotion For Hero Cops

The Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, has approved post-humous promotion for the two policemen that were killed during a robbery at a branch of Zenith Bank in Owerri, Imo State.

The Imo State Commissioner of Police, Chris Ezike, told Punch correspondent in a telephone interview on Monday that the surviving policeman, Sergeant Otu Attang, would also be given a special promotion for his gallantry.

Sergeants Chukwudi Iboko and Sunday Agbo were killed after confronting a four-man gang in a gun battle, which was captured on a Closed Circuit Television camera. The CP explained that Attang was being treated at the police hospital in Owerri as an out-patient.

“We have done the needful; the command has recommended them (the slain policemen) for post-humous promotion and the one injured for a special promotion and the IG is not aversed to the idea,” he stated.


Ezike said Attang, who lost one of his eyes during the attack, was being treated by three surgeons, including an ophthalmologist.

 He denied allegations by Iboko’s family that they had been abandoned by the police, insisting that the entitlements of the slain policemen were being processed and would be paid soon.

He said, “The police officers are our men, so the issue of abandonment couldn’t have arisen; they are heroes.

“They did a gallant job and each time our men are wounded or die in action, it is painful. It is one of the great pains you would endure in this job. We have not abandoned the family.”

The CP declined to disclose exactly what the command had done for the families of the dead policemen.

 Ezike said it was too early to conduct surgeries on the eye.

He said, “The eye needs to heal before you can talk of other surgeries. Three surgeons are working on this man.

Trump travel ban dealt another blow, faces high court next

Another U.S. appeals court stomped on President Donald Trump's revised travel ban Monday, saying the administration violated federal immigration law and failed to provide a valid reason for keeping people from six mostly Muslim nations from coming to the country.


The decision by a unanimous three-judge panel of the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals helps keep the travel ban blocked and deals Trump a second big legal defeat on the policy in less than three weeks.

The administration said it would seek further review at the U.S. Supreme Court, as it has already done with a ruling against the travel ban by another appeals court last month. The high court is likely to consider the cases in tandem.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions insisted the new decision would harm national security — an argument the judges rejected.

"The executive branch is entrusted with the responsibility to keep the country safe under Article II of the Constitution," Sessions said in a written statement. "Unfortunately, this injunction prevents the president from fully carrying out his Article II duties and has a chilling effect on security operations overall."

Hawaii Attorney General Doug Chin, who sued to stop the travel ban, said the 9th Circuit ruling "really shows that we have three branches of government and that there are checks and balances. ... So to me, this is everything that we learned in social studies in high school just coming to play exactly the way it should."

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia last month found the 90-day ban unconstitutional, saying it was "steeped in animus and directed at a single religious group" rather than necessary for national security. It cited the president's campaign statements calling for a "total and complete shutdown" on Muslims entering the U.S.

The 9th Circuit, which heard arguments in Seattle last month in Hawaii's challenge to the ban, found no need to analyze those statements. It ruled based on immigration law, not the Constitution.
"Immigration, even for the president, is not a one-person show," the judges said, adding: "National security is not a 'talismanic incantation' that, once invoked, can support any and all exercise of executive power."


Judges Michael Hawkins, Ronald Gould and Richard Paez — all appointed by President Bill Clinton — said the travel ban violated immigration law by discriminating against people based on their nationality when it comes to issuing visas and by failing to demonstrate that their entry would hurt American interests.

The president's order did not tie citizens of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen to terrorist organizations or identify them as contributors to "active conflict," the court said. It also did not provide any link between their nationality and their propensity to commit terrorism.

"In short, the order does not provide a rationale explaining why permitting entry of nationals from the six designated countries under current protocols would be detrimental to the interests of the United States," the ruling said.

The judges pointed to a June 5 tweet by Trump saying the order was aimed at "dangerous countries." That helped show he was not assessing whether the six countries had ties to terrorism, they said.

The White House predicted a win at the Supreme Court.
"Frankly, I think any lawyer worth their salt 100 percent agrees that the president's fully within his rights and his responsibilities to do what is necessary to protect the country," spokesman Sean Spicer said.

Trump's suspension of the U.S. refugee program also remains blocked. The 9th Circuit said he was required to consult with Congress in setting the number of refugees allowed into the country in a given year and that he could not decrease it midyear. The refugee program is not at issue in the 4th Circuit case.

The president issued the executive order after the initial version caused chaos and protests at airports and was blocked by a Seattle judge and a different three-judge 9th Circuit panel. The new version was designed to better withstand legal scrutiny and spelled out more of a national security rationale.

Several states and civil rights groups challenged the revised ban, saying it remained rooted in discrimination and exceeded the president's authority.

U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson in Hawaii blocked the new version in March, citing what he called "significant and unrebutted evidence of religious animus" in Trump's campaign statements.

The 9th Circuit narrowed Watson's ruling in some minor ways, allowing the administration to conduct an internal review of its vetting procedures for refugees and visa applicants. - AP