CHARLES LEVINSON
CAIRO—To the outside world, the leader of Egypt's anti-Mubarak revolt is a scholarly former United Nations official named Mohamed ElBaradei.
But to the seasoned opposition leaders inside Egypt who have been at the center of the country's mass demonstrations, Mr. ElBaradei may be little more than a transitional figurehead.
In the weeks leading up to the extraordinary uprising, a spectrum of opposition figures banded together to plan an alternative vision to the regime of President Hosni Mubarak. Even before last month's popular ouster of Tunisia's president electrified protesters in Egypt and across the Middle East, these people held dozens of meetings lasting more than 100 hours. They created a 100-member "shadow legislature" of union leaders, judges and representatives from youth parties and the country's banned but influential Muslim Brotherhood, say people in attendance.
While the speed and scope of the past week's protests in Egypt largely took them by surprise, the opposition figures quickly assembled a game plan. On Tuesday, when the shadow legislature's 10-person steering committee met for the first time, they agreed to back Mr. ElBaradei in their negotiations with Mr. Mubarak's government.
But these people say they see Mr. ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace-prize winner of international standing, as less of a future president than a fair and nonpartisan figurehead and an arbiter capable of refereeing their discussions. Because he has spent much of his life outside the gritty world of domestic politics, he is also seen as posing little threat to these parties should they begin the hardnosed business of vying in earnest for power.
Mr. ElBaradei's appearance Sunday night in Cairo's central Tahrir Square disappointed many activists, who felt he had failed to seize the moment to rally the crowd. Many protesters said they didn't notice he was there or know that he had spoken. He hasn't shown up to the square since, including for Tuesday's "march of millions," which drew hundreds of thousands of Egyptians to demand Mr. Mubarak's ouster.
"The protestors out here in the square are strong and inspiring, and when ElBaradei came he seemed kind of weak next to them, not like someone who would make me follow them," said Heba Sultan, a young democracy activist in Tahrir Square.
Mr. ElBaradei also hasn't attended meetings of the shadow legislature's steering committee—of which he is a member—so far this week, following his return to Cairo from abroad as demonstrations were already gaining speed. A spokesman for Mr. ElBaradei said he lives too far away from central Cairo and has been tired out by the last few days of demonstrations.
Members of Egypt's Opposition Steering Committee
Mohamed ElBaradei: Former head of International Atomic Energy Agency, leader of Egypt's National Association for Change
Mohammad Baltagi:Head of Muslim Brotherhood bloc of lawmakers from 2005 to 2010
Hamdeen Sabahy: Head of the Karama Party, a secular, left-wing Arab Nationalist party
Abdel Galil Mustafa: The coordinator for the National Association for Change, Mr. ElBaradei's group
Mahmoud Al-Khudairi: Former vice president of Egypt's appeals court
George Ishaq: Former head of the Kefaya protest movement, which led the protest against President Mubarak in 2005
Abdel Ezz Hariri: Formerly of Tegammu, a secular leftist party
Ayman Nour: Head of the liberal secular Ghad party. Ran against Mubarak in 2005 elections
Magdy Ahmed Hussein: Head of the pro-Islamist Labor Party
Osama Ghazali Harb: A former member of Mubarak's ruling NDP and Mubarak family confidant; left the party and founded the secular and liberal National Democratic Front. Editor in chief of Siyasat Dowlia, an Egyptian journal on international affairs
Youth Movements: These groups have been asked to send 3-5 members to the committee:
6 April Youth Facebook group started in 2008 to show solidarity with striking workers
Pro ElBaradei Youth
Al Ghad Youth
Muslim Brotherhood Youth
National Democratic Front Youth
In an interview Wednesday with a small group of journalists, Mr. ElBaradei gave voice to the anger that spread among demonstrators when Mr. Mubarak said Tuesday he would serve out his term, though not seek re-election. Mr. ElBaradei called the announcement "an act of deception" and a "ploy."
Mr. ElBaradei was diffident about his political aspirations, a stance that has come to frustrate some supporters. "I am not interested in any position," he said. "If I am able to put Egypt on the right track, that would be my ultimate aim. But at the same time, as I said, if people want me to run, I won't let them down."
He dismissed criticisms that he had been absent from Egypt for critical periods. "The people say I'm parachuting. When I was away, they were crying that he deserted us. When I'm back they say he's parachuting to take charge of the revolution," he said. "People don't understand that I was not in and out on leisurely trips...You need to get the sympathy and understanding of the international community for the plight of Egyptians."
Mr. ElBaradei's emergence as an opposition figure is especially surprising given that when he stepped down in November 2009 after a dozen years heading the U.N'.s International Atomic Energy Agency, he expressed no interest in becoming involved in Egyptian politics. "When people were first approaching him saying, 'Will you run for president of Egypt in 2011?' he was very dismissive of it," says Laban Coblentz, Mr. ElBaradei's longtime speechwriter, who recently helped him write a memoir slated to be published in April.
But ex-colleagues say Mr. ElBaradei, whose international profile soared after he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with the IAEA in 2005, experienced a change of heart after teaching himself how to use social-networking sites on the Internet to monitor Egyptian events from afar.
Among other things, he discovered Facebook "fan" pages with thousands of followers urging him to run for president this year. His own Facebook page, which is frequently updated, currently has more than 314,000 admirers.
"It was really this last 14 months, where someone I knew as not being particularly computer savvy, taught himself to use Facebook and Twitter and YouTube and started to do in virtual space which was forbidden to do by the Mubarak regime, the freedom of assembly by large groups," says Mr. Coblentz.
ElBaradei: From the Archives
* Opposition Unites in Egypt
(01/31/2011)
* In Upheaval, ElBaradei Is a Wild Card
(01/29/2011)
* New Contender Emerges in Egypt
(12/10/2010)
* Egypt's Unusual Political Pair
(08/26/2010)
* ElBaradei Widens Egypt Reform Push
(04/22/2010)
* Egypt's Opposition Gives ElBaradei a Hero's Welcome
(02/21/2010)
* Opinion: ElBaradei: Let Us Inspect
(03/07/2003)
Mr. ElBaradei last year founded the National Association for Change, a grouping of opposition movements whose constituents have since taken a central role in organizing the past days' protests. That association was, in turn, a major player in assembling the shadow parliament, following Egypt's widely criticized elections in November.
With Mr. ElBaradei away from the country, about a dozen opposition groups conducted some 60 meetings hashing the 100-legislator parallel government. "We devised the shadow parliament so that when the time for change came, we have the mechanisms in place to make decisions," said Wa'il Nawara, a member of the body from the secular Ghad Party. "We were just in time."
The group meets in the third-story headquarters of the liberal-secular Ghad, founded by Ayman Nour, who challenged Mr. Mubarak in the 2005 presidential elections. Mr. Nour was subsequently tossed in jail on fraud charges, which he and other opposition activists said were trumped up by the government.
The shadow parliament's meeting chambers overlook Talaat Harb Square in downtown Cairo. There are three rows of oak benches for the faux lawmakers, a three-seat raised platform in front for the chamber's presiding officials and a speaker's podium.
The groups have agreed to refrain from competing with each other during the current transitional period, calling it an arena to hash out the rules for electoral competition in the future, according to the members. "This isn't the time for competition between the parties," said Osama Ghazali Harb, one of 10 people on the steering committee.
Journal Photos: Clashes in Cairo
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Guy Martin for The Wall Street Journal
Anti-government protesters clashed with supporters of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in Tahrir Square.
Photos: Wednesday Protests
View Slideshow
[SB10001424052748703960804576119733005482512]
Lefteris Pitarakis/Associated Press
Pro-government demonstrators, bottom, watched as cars burned during clashes with anti-government demonstrators, top, behind barriers, in Tahrir Square.
Regional Upheaval
View Interactive
A succession of rallies and demonstrations, in Egypt, Jordan, Yemen and Algeria have been inspired directly by the popular outpouring of anger that toppled Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. See how these uprising progressed.
One pivotal participant has been the Muslim Brotherhood, a Cairo-based group banned in Egypt that hopes to meld the Islamic religion with Egypt's legal system.
Its representatives reassured skeptics among their secular allies who have long feared the Brotherhood would try to dominate any alliance they joined, when they were content to take just 15% of the shadow parliament's seats.
The parliament had planned to use its inaugural session last Sunday to elect a speaker and choose a spokesman. But amid an unexpected popular uprising against Mr. Mubarak, the body instead plunged straight to work, according to members.
It appointed a 10-person committee that has assumed informal leadership of the swelling protest movement. Its members include Mr. ElBaradei and a Muslim Brotherhood representative.
Another member is the Ghad Party's Mr. Nour, who became an international cause célèbre for his jailing following the 2005 election. "Mubarak wants us to think we have only two choices between indefinite tyranny and total chaos, and we reject this," Mr. Nour told a small group of journalists in his party's headquarters in downtown Cairo on Wednesday.
The committee of 10 met for the first time Tuesday morning, over tea and biscuits in the waiting room of the medical clinic belonging to one of the committee members. Their first task was to coordinate their response to an offer by Egypt's newly appointed Vice President Omar Suleiman, who until Saturday was Mr. Mubarak's longtime trusted intelligence chief, to hold negotiations with all opposition forces, including the banned Brotherhood.
They decided they wouldn't negotiate as long as Mr. Mubarak remained in power, they said in a statement Tuesday. They met again on Wednesday morning, to craft a response to Mr. Mubarak's speech late Tuesday night, in which he said he wouldn't run again for president in September.
Mohamed Al-Baltagi, the Muslim Brotherhood's representative on the 10-man steering committee, gave his analysis of the speech, say people present at the meeting. He said Mr. Mubarak struck a sentimental tone that would likely appeal to some segments of Egyptian society, these people said. The next day, pro-government protesters turned out in Cairo, mounting a sometimes-brutal response to the mounting wave of antiregime protesters.
Committee members are waiting for a handful of youth activist groups to pick three to five representatives to join the committee, which would bring the number to 13 or 15.
Mr. Baltagi was the president of the Muslim Brotherhood's parliamentary bloc of lawmakers from 2005 until 2010, when the government wiped out the Brotherhood's presence in parliament. His movement's involvement in the infant opposition alliance underscores one of its more remarkable achievements. So far, participants have managed to overcome the longstanding divisions between the country's secular and Islamist opposition movements.
Mr. Baltagi didn't answer his phone Wednesday, but other Brotherhood officials said their movement was willing to put aside ideological differences in the face of a common enemy, Mr. Mubarak.
The government has long used divide-and-rule tactics and state funding to keep the country's traditional and established opposition parties weak, unpopular and unable to pose any kind of real challenge to the government.
These parties are viewed by many Egyptians to be too deferential and cooperative with the government. Most of these established, legal opposition parties have refused to join ranks with the new opposition alliance, although many individuals within their ranks have joined. A spokesman for one of the parties, the Nasserists, said they didn't join due to unspecified disagreements with Mr. ElBaradei.
—Steve Stecklow, Matt Bradley and David Crawford contributed to this article.
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