CAIRO – Thousands of protesters in Cairo booed Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Tuesday as he said he would remain in power but not seek re-election, reiterating their call for his immediate departure.
In a televised address, Mubarak said he would not seek a sixth term in September, but also indicated he would not cede the presidency immediately, eliciting boos and chants of “Leave, leave” from protesters in central Cairo.
Demonstrators have staged eight days of unprecedented anti-government protests, calling for Mubarak to step down after 30 years in office.
His insistence that he would remain at the helm to oversee the transition also fell far short of the demands of opposition groups that have set him a Friday deadline to quit to allow a clear break with his 30-year rule.
Despite years of studied ambiguity over whether he would seek a new term in September and his refusal until this week to name a vice president, the 82-year-old incumbent insisted that he had never intended to stay on office beyond this year.
“I say in all honesty, and without taking into consideration the current situation, I was not planning to present myself for a new presidential term,” he said.
“I have spent enough time serving Egypt and its people.
“This country, I have lived in it, I have gone to war for it, and history will judge me,” he said to boos from the thousands of protesters still gathered long after nightfall in Tahrir Square.
He said the country had a choice “between chaos and stability” after the clashes between protesters and security personnel that marred the first days of the protests leaving an estimated 300 people dead.
“I speak to you in difficult conditions which put Egypt and its people to the test and which could drag it into the unknown,” he said.
“My first responsibility is now to bring security and stability to the nation to ensure a peaceful transition of power.”
Mubarak pledged to introduce amendments to the constitution to limit the head of state’s term of office and to make it easier for opposition groups to field candidates in presidential elections.
Opposition leaders have long demanded such reforms but their ambitions of the protest movement have gone much further after the mass mobilisation of the past week, inspired the ouster of veteran Tunisian strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Mubarak’s remarks on Tuesday night did little to appease the crowds still gathered in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, a focal point for demonstrations in the Egyptian capital.
As midnight neared, they insisted they would not leave until Mubarak stepped down.
One protester addressed the crowd through a megaphone.
The president “is very stubborn, but we are more stubborn than he is,” he shouted. “We will not leave the square.”
Mubarak’s speech did little to sway Ahmad Abu al-Ela, an engineering student.
“Had Mubarak said ‘I’m going to leave,’ I would have gone. I’m going to stay until he leaves.”
Opposition groups said there could be no negotiations with the regime until Mubarak leaves and former UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei, who some consider as a potential figurehead for the protest movement, said Friday has been set as “departure day” for the veteran president.
Mubarak’s announcement did go a long way to meeting quietly voiced US calls for him to make his future plans plain.
US President Barack Obama called a high-level meeting at the White House shortly before Mubarak’s speech as a US official confirmed that he had sent a message to the Egyptian leader through a veteran former diplomat Frank Wisner urging him to announce that he would not stand in September’s elections.
Writing in New York Times, senior Senator John Kerry said it was time for Mubarak to say clearly he will step down.
“It is not enough for President Mubarak to pledge ‘fair’ elections, as he did on Saturday,” said Kerry, who is chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
“The most important step that he can take is to address his nation and declare that neither he nor the son (Gamal) he has been positioning as his successor will run in the presidential election this year.”
But a committee of Egyptian opposition groups, which includes both ElBaradei and the powerful Muslim Brotherhood, pledged that there could be no negotiations with the regime until Mubarak “leaves.”
ElBaradei told Al-Arabiya television that Mubarak should leave by Friday.
“What I have heard (from protesters) is that they want this to end, if not today (Tuesday), then by Friday maximum,” he said.
But he called for Mubarak to be spared prosecution. “I’m for a safe exit for President Mubarak,” the Nobel peace laureate told US-funded Al-Hurra television.
The angry eight-day revolt — in which an estimated 300 people have died and more than 3,000 been injured — has sent jitters throughout the Middle East.
King Abdullah II of Jordan sacked his government after weeks of demands for change, Yemen’s president summoned parliament ahead of a “day of rage” called for Thursday, and a Facebook group of Syrian youth called for a peaceful revolution to start on Friday.
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