Saturday, September 17, 2011

AUC strike : The Students apologize for the Flag incident

In a statement officially issued by the Students movement in the AUC , the students participating in the AUC officially apologize for the flag  incident.
Here is the statement published online by Students union vice president Ahmed Ezzat. I will re-publish it in my blog here as it clarifies many things.
Dear AUC community,
There has been a lot of controversy about taking down of the American flag. Let it be clear that in no way shape or form was this meant to be taken as an insult or political statement. To any and all students that took offense to this action, this was not our intention and we sincerely apologize.
To understand this incident we have to make clear the entire events, which occurred earlier that day. As it had been agreed with Professor Anderson, we conducted a well-organized forum, which started at 1:00 PM, and had to last till we find a proper solution. However, Professor Anderson suddenly and with no warning left the audience and speakers in the middle of the forum. We found this act disrespectful to everyone and not suitable for an appreciated senior administrator as Professor Anderson.
As a reaction to that, some students, among them the Student Union Vice President Ahmed Ezzat, tried to rush behind her hoping to convince her to return to the forum. However, she entered the building without talking to anyone. And what needs to be mentioned here is that Professor Lisa is a diplomatic figure having two assigned Bodyguards. While the students, mentioned earlier, were trying to talk with her, her bodyguards attacked them, which violates the American values of democracy, freedom of expression and human rights this diplomatic figure represents. Consequently, it was decided that the American flag representing, also, those values should be dismounted and returned to professor Lisa as a reminder that she does not respect them. The flag was taken down to honor it since the administration itself had violated these values and disrespected what the flag represents.
Nothing was done to harm the flag or tarnish its pride. It was folded and given back humbly by the SU President Ahmed Alaa, Chair Senate Hesham Shaker and Chair of SJB Amr Abdel Wahab. The flag was received back by. And we apologized at once to all American Faculty, staff and fellow colleges who felt hurt by this act. We do however also request a formal apology from the President’s security, as force was unnecessary.
Furthermore we would like to encourage more students to attend the protests in front of administration to speak out against a large number of problems in the University. The money students pay toward the university is their business and they have a right to know where and how it is being spent. Reasons such as “budget deficit” can no longer be accepted as there is no proof presented to show a deficit especially one that cannot be covered previous years surpluses.
Bad financial management and the privacy of their books are things we feel should not be accepted by the stake holders of this university and a lot must be done to overcome these problems. Therefore we invite all students, faculty and staff to join us in demonstrations against suspicious financial behavior and persistent lack of concrete responses from administration.
Thank you for your time and we hope to see you in front of HUSS on Sunday.
We Serve,
AUC STUDENT MOVEMENET
I hate to say but strangely and suddenly the mainstream media is so interested in covering what is going on in the AUC.
People are still angry from what happened. It is for sure uncalculated step that overshadowed the whole strike , nobody cares now about the demands of the workers or the students anymore but rather the incident itself.
Those who hate Egypt and try to use the incident to attack the revolution , I hope that they found something useful in their life to do.

2 comments:

  1. Salam Zeinobia,
    As u have said it was a rush step to pull the American flag down..but its normal if you are talking about Egyptian`s action in here..cuz we r emotional ppl and this is what differ between us and other countries and it is from the main reasons which lacking us in our politics.
    we are people who are reacting not acting and all our reactions comes out emotionally without calculating it nor thinking about it.
    we have to start look around and learn how civilized people do in other countries so no one can accuse them ignorant people.
    just like what happened infront of the israeli`s embassy while i was there when Ahmed Elshahat pulled down the flag we all celebrated and felt so much excited..but when the government honor him and give him a flat and a nice job...u will see exactly what we have seen on 9-9...many poor ignorant people will do anything to be heroes and aiming just like what Elshahat got(flat...media...job).

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  2. Dear Anonymous #1,

    This is nothing but hard BS. What differences between us and the other countries that are you talking about?

    The whole thing is nonsense. It was the AUC President's mistake at first place to pay attention and listen to those students, a bunch of spoiled, stupid morons.

    ReplyDelete

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