Egypt's army and police locked in growing power struggle

Analysis: Tensions are growing between the Egyptian army and police, as the army tries to consolidate its hold on power, says Khaled Abdel Al.
4 min read
16 April, 2015
The army plays a leading role in Egyptian society and the economy [Getty]
The protesters of Egypt once chanted "down with military rule" in their millions. Today, dozens of Egyptian police officers are repeating the chant.

They are reacting to the military's attempts to arrest a police officer for assaulting an army pilot after asking to see his driver's licence at a checkpoint.


This is not an isolated incident and a power struggle between the two security institutions has deepened since Abdel Fattah al-Sisi became president last year.

The conflict under Sisi and Mubarak

Last year saw the highest number of clashes between Egypt's police and army for the past few decades.
Al-Araby al-Jadeed has documented accounts of clashes between Egypt's police and army over the past few decades. Last year saw the highest number of clashes between the two sides.

In March 2014, there was a fight between police from Cairo's Imbaba police station and army forces stationed there. Security sources reported that the brawl started after a police officer assaulted an army recruit.

The situation escalated and army forces fired tear gas at the police who were chanting "down with the military rule".


The same month another fight took place between an army officer and the police officer in charge of a checkpoint on the Port Said-Ismailia road. The police officer verbally assaulted the army officer and his wife. The soldier called out the military police, who took the checkpoint team to an army camp.

There was only one documented case of clashes between the army and the police under Hosni Mubarak. Military academy students attacked the 15 May city police station causing extensive damage and burning police cars. They were enraged at the police's bad treatment of one of the students.

A security and economic analysis

These incidents reflect an ongoing clash for power between Egypt's interior and defence ministries. Mohammad Yassin, a former officer in the interior ministry, argues that army generals see police officers as undisciplined.


The interior ministry has tried to copy the armed forces' approach by creating its own economic empire to guarantee influence in the ruling circles.

"Alongside the defence ministry, the interior ministry also has some control over the country's economic resources, thought companies its owns and companies it runs," Yassin told al-Araby.

Tension is growing as the army feels its social influence receding, while the police enjoy a wide social influence.

A number of laws have been passed under Sisi to bolster the armed forces' role in maintaining internal security, including granting extensive powers to military courts. This has been seen as an attempt to weaken the influence of the civilian judiciary, and subordinate the police to the armed forces.

Sisi has granted a number of army generals civilian positions to promote the armed forces' role in the political scene. They include Khaled Abdul Salam al-Sadr, who is the first military man to become the secretary general of Egypt's parliament.

Mahmoud Khalaf, an adviser at the Nasser Military Academy, told al-Araby that Sisi had granted the military extensive powers so they can manage the current security situation. He denied it was because of Sisi's lack of confidence in the interior ministry.

However, Khalaf disagreed that there was a conflict between the state's apparatus. "The police and army are united," he said.

Weakening the interior ministry's influence


The military institution has restored much of the influence it lost during Mubarak's era. Omar Ashour, a professor of security studies at the University of Exeter, said: "It did this by weakening the interior ministry, and promoting the general intelligence service and military intelligence."

Ashour added that under Mubarak the interior ministry's role grew at the expense of the defence ministry
because the military institution did not welcome the inheritance of power, which the regime was trying to promote with the help of the interior ministry.

The military institution saw that Egypt should be ruled by one of its own, as it considered itself historically entitled to ruling the country.


During Mubarak's rule the security apparatus took the lead in imposing the President's authority to maintain his regime.
According to a research paper by Yezid Sayigh at the Carnegie Middle East Centre, Above the state: the officers' republic in Egypt, the rise of the security state during Mubarak's rule, when the security apparatus took the lead in imposing the president's authority, led to an "expanding reliance on the security services".

Their total strength "grew to an estimated 1.4 million by the time of Mubarak's removal", and the "interior ministry's annual budget meanwhile rose at three times the rate of increase of the defence budget."


Yezid adds that relegating the armed forces to the background during Mubarak's rule "fueled at times intense competition over resources and institutional 'turf battles'."

In addition, the armed forces' "contempt for the interior ministry and its associated police and security agencies deepened during the last decade of Mubarak's rule, in part because they were deemed to be implicated in the widening circle of corruption associated with the rise of Mubarak."

Ashour said Mubarak's state security service became the strongest police body, employing nearly 100,000 people, with more power than all other institutions combined.

It was the main pillar on which the Mubarak regime based its efforts to achieve its goals, namely the inheritance of power.

Ashour said he believed this conflict between the two institutions would continue over the next few years. He also described the clashes between the army and the police as a "black comedy".

This article is an edited translation from our Arabic edition.