Cairo — ANHRI said today that Field Marshal Tantawi, Chairman of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF), announced a decision that disregards the Egyptian people's minds and circumvents a demand that the Egyptians have insisted on for 31 years. Tantawi's announced the lifting of the state of emergency in all parts of the country, except in cases of thuggery. This exception practically means that the state of emergency is ongoing, and not lifted. Laws are either in place, abolished, or amended. Vows or pledges are of no value as long as a law is in place.

Field Marshal Tantawi overlooked the fact that the Egyptians were not deceived by the ousted dictator in 2010, as he had claimed to halt the emergency law except in cases of terrorism and drug trafficking. Such oral vows open the door wide to repression and fabrication of lawsuits allegedly related to thuggery. The effects of the emergency law are traceable on the bodies of hundreds who have been tortured by the military police, and the case files of thousands and thousands who have been referred to unjust and unfair military trials. The victims of military trials have been youth who insist to complement their revolution, or poor people who have been portrayed as thugs. On the other hand, corrupts, criminals, and torturers who ruined the Egyptian people's lives have not been referred to such trials.

"The state of emergency has not benefit any one but the despotic system through out Mubarak's or the SCAF's rule. The continuation of the state of emergency implies the continuation of the same political will and its insistence on the siege of the Egyptian with unjust laws. It also distances the Egyptians from democracy, devotes exceptional powers to the SCAF, and exacerbates the already widespread impunity. There is no alternative to abolish it in a genuine and earnest manner" said ANHRI.

"It is time for the step-down of the SCAF. The Egyptians do not want to waste more time than a whole year under a rule that has maintained most of Mubarak's authoritarian regime, used representatives of the National Democratic Party, tried the revolutionaries, defamed political and democratic powers, and has not met his promises of power handover and lifting the state of emergency" added ANHRI.