Year later, Egypt activists seek further revolution

? A crowd of anti-military activists suddenly converged on a bustling Cairo boulevard, erecting makeshift screens and showing videos of soldiers beating protesters, dragging women on the ground, partially stripping one and stomping on her chest. Their message: The generals ruling Egypt have to go.

The activists who led the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak last year have been holding hundreds of so-called flash mobs around the country, in a campaign they call “Liars.”

By showing people recent abuses by the military, they say they have injected new public support for their demand that the generals quickly surrender power.

But it also raises questions.

“What do they want?” one passer-by, Mohammed Ali, asked at one such gathering this week.

“Even if (the military) are liars… we are going to get power transferred to civilians in six months. That is not bad,” the 30-year-old said. “It doesn’t deserve all this noise. Let’s wait and see.”

Wednesday marks the first anniversary of the start of the 18-day wave of protests that toppled Mubarak. Activists are trying to turn public discontent over lack of change into support for continuing revolutionary protests. But they face the task of explaining to Egyptians who are sick of turmoil: Revolution for what?

The revolution’s second year, the activists say, must pressure both the ruling military, which they maintain is as authoritarian as Mubarak, and the Muslim Brotherhood, which dominates the new parliament and which they fear is allying itself with the generals.

The anniversary shows the tensions. Each of the country’s power brokers has its own plans to mark the day, underlining the stark differences over the very meaning of the revolution and raising the potential for a clash. State and pro-military media blare warnings that the protesters aim to “burn the country,” raising concerns over a crackdown.

The activists are organizing new nationwide protests for the occasion. Thousands rallied in Tahrir Square on Friday, kicking off what they say will be several days of demonstrations, including Monday when parliament convenes and on the Wednesday anniversary.

The military has put together its own elaborate Jan. 25 celebrations, declaring the day a national holiday. It plans a nationwide air show, including flyovers by warplanes that it boasts will be bigger than those it holds for anniversaries of the 1952 coup that first brought the generals to the helm of Egyptian politics.

Other planes will drop gift coupons to the public. Officers will be decorated for their role helping the anti-Mubarak protests.

The military’s message is that it supported the anti-Mubarak uprising, but the time for revolution is over.

“Stability is the first goal,” said Maj. General Ismail Etman, a member of the military council that took power after Mubarak’s Feb. 11 fall. “If there is tension between the people and the armed forces, it must be removed … We want the big family to enjoy love and stability.”