As Egypt Unveils Its ‘New Suez Canal,’ Dissenters Make Voices Heard Online

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/07/world/middleeast/as-egypt-unveils-its-new-suez-canal-dissenters-make-voices-heard-online.html

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As Egypt’s government congratulated itself on Thursday at the very grand opening of a new side channel to the Suez Canal, the reaction on social networks to the televised pageantry was divided between praise for President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi from his supporters and jeers from his critics.

Mr. Sisi, the former defense minister who forced Egypt’s first freely elected president, Mohamed Morsi, from power two years ago, led the celebrations of the expansion from the deck of the presidential yacht, which was used to inaugurate the original canal in 1869 and to take the country’s last king into exile after a military coup in 1952.

The president was presented as the hero of the day in fawning television coverage and in a promotional video released by the canal authority that referred to “the new Suez Canal” as “Egypt’s gift to the world.”

With demonstrations effectively banned, and tens of thousands of Mr. Sisi’s opponents languishing in jail, protests from Egypt’s dissident bloggers were confined to social networks, where writers and activists heckled the proceedings as they unfolded on television.

One parody account in Mr. Sisi’s name even compared his military attire to that of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the Libyan dictator.

Another blogger mocked the president’s pose on the yacht by blending it with a romantic image from the film “Titanic.”

As if to drive the point home that dissent had no place in post-revolutionary Egypt, the government staged celebrations in Tahrir Square in Cairo, where opposition protests are no longer tolerated.

Still, some images of subtle dissent from the officially endorsed happiness could be found on the streets.

By contrast, there was nothing but praise for the massive infrastructure project from governments whose officials attended the ceremony, including the United States, Russia, Britain and France.

Perhaps the only note of discord from the actual scene of the ceremony was struck by some members of the foreign press corps, who were unhappy to find that the government that had arranged to transport them to the remote location seemed less interested in returning them home afterward.