The final hours

Demonstrators marched to the presidential palace in what was looming as a dangerous showdown, Alaa Abdel-Ghani reports

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We knew they were coming. It was Thursday night and president Mubarak failed to say the words the world had been waiting to hear. He did not say good-bye nor did he provide any synonyms: departing, quitting, exiting, moving on, sailing into the sunset, leaving, leaving on a jet plane. Just political double speak about delegating some facile powers to his vice president.

We all thought he would be stepping down but he blindsided us all.

We knew we were in trouble when immediately after the president's not-going-anywhere speech, a teenager in Tahrir being interviewed on CNN, cried: "We're not going anywhere as long as he remains here!"

The anti-climatic address had come on a day of feverish anticipation that Mubarak would resign. Preceded by great expectations and fuelled by members of the US administration, including Barack Obama, Egypt's ruling party as well as the media here and abroad, it was widely expected we would hear Mubarak's resignation speech.

It didn't happen. Mubarak became the biggest party pooper, coming up with the biggest letdown in the history of speeches.

In seconds, the protesters' hopes fell from sky high to rock bottom.

The hundreds of thousands of people who had gathered in Tahrir Square to hear the president speak were very quiet when he finished. Then a storm of rage erupted. The Tahrir temperature had jumped to the stratosphere.

The majority decided to stay put, but thousands marched to the TV building where they effectively surrounded it and thousands more went straight for the presidential palace. It was the first time since the revolution began that the home of Mubarak had been targeted.

This was it, the expected showdown -- the people vs their president -- the country had been fearing. The time had come for the army to make a choice: either side with Mubarak or the demonstrators. The soldiers did not relish being in the middle. For weeks, the protesters in Tahrir Square had been chanting, "The people and the army are one." Indeed, the army had not fired a single bullet into anybody since being deployed early in the clashes. But one never knew. The tinderbox needed just one fired-up teenager, wanting freedom or wanting to impress his girlfriend, breaking the palace cordon. Then what? The army, who had vowed never to fire on the people they swore to protect, might have to break their promise. And that would set off an explosion.

They started trickling in at 1:45am, almost three hours after Mubarak burst their celebratory balloon. Apparently, the demonstrators had walked the 12km distance from Tahrir to the palace.

Few people knew whether Mubarak and his family or both were in fact in the palace. His Thursday night speech was obviously pre-recorded, evidenced by the shoddy editing. He could have left before the speech was aired, but the demonstrators came to the palace nonetheless.

Sitting by its lonely self, our car had been parked on the corner of Heliopolis Club which leads directly to the palace, and right in the path of the demonstrators. We scurried downstairs to park it in safer environs.

On the street leading to the palace, the demonstrators gained in strength, reaching a couple of thousand. But the palace was out of bounds. The farthest the protesters could go was up to the main entrance of the club, around 400 metres from the palace's gates. On the other side, Salah Salem was closed to all people and traffic. Army tanks and barbed wire of the Republican Guards prevented more advances.

A little chanting and soon the demonstrators called it a night, returning in small groups to Roxy Square before disappearing.

We knew they would be back the next day with reinforcements. Friday, 11 February was going to attract millions to Tahrir and elsewhere.

On fateful Friday, they started coming way before noon prayers, the appointed time every Friday since the protests began, for demonstrations to start. It seems they couldn't wait.

My family and I joined the crowds at 2pm. Can't participate in history in the making from your balcony.

Before entering the main arena of the protests, men and women had to be searched by polite volunteers of both sexes.

Inside the action, some citizenry milled about, some held placards denouncing the government, and some chanted in unison what had become familiar anti-government refrains orchestrated by youths whose voices had cracked from so much strain placed on their vocal chords.

As we took pictures of the shouting demonstrators -- they would ham it up for the cameras -- it was apparent they weren't so tough after all. We found them to be nice guys, very peaceful, civilised and decent. It was a wonder how this non-violent people were getting so close to toppling a regime entrenched for 30 years.

The crowds from Tahrir, Heliopolis and maybe elsewhere converged near the palace. You couldn't tell them apart, but why did we want to know who's who anyway? One of the best things about the revolution was that it didn't matter who the revolutionaries were. In this giant melting pot, personal divisions by class, age, education, religion and income disappeared. Egyptians set aside differences that would have once kept them from barely talking or even acknowledging each other on the street.

At 4pm, TV announced that a presidential statement was going to be made but people had learned their lesson the day before, taking the news of another "breaking news" with much scepticism. A neither here-nor-there concession would not, to the masses of millions, be nearly enough.

But something was indeed happening. In a symbolic, powerful message that was perhaps foretelling the future, the presidential tanks turned their turrets away from the crowds, and on one tank a soldier planted the Egyptian flag on top. It was one of the most endearing acts of the 18-day revolution.

Then, as the clock struck six, came the momentous news: Hosni Mubarak had finally resigned as president, giving in to the No 1 demand of the demonstrators. VP Omar Suleiman broke the news in 50 words.

Mubarak apparently did not have it in him to make the announcement himself. No problem. The determination of the demonstrators gave way to unbridled joy.

Many of the soldiers near the palace left their posts, leaving their tanks as well as the multitudes behind to sing and dance at their leisure. It was, after all, the people's party.

Few understood what U-turn had occurred in 24 hours, between Thursday night and Friday night, between a president staying put to the white flag. Somebody, perhaps the army, perhaps Washington, must have played a major role in pressing Mubarak into retirement. But for now who cared? This was a moment of pure bliss; the why and how could be answered later.

For an hour the protesters were rollicking, lapping up every historic moment. They then took their ecstasy elsewhere, leaving Heliopolis and the presidential palace peaceful once more.

As they marched out the neighbourhood, you could see how dense the crowds really were. A conservative estimate put them at 40,000.

In a few more hours, Obama would make his "Egyptians have inspired us" speech. The people on the streets didn't hear it but would be proud of themselves when they eventually did. A non-violent, people power revolution had won and Egypt had set a thunderous example to the rest of the world.