Egypt protest organiser released to hero's welcome

Many in the crowd said they were inspired by Mr Ghonim, a 30-year-old Google marketing manager who was a key figure in the online campaign that sparked the first protest on January 25 to demand the removal of president Hosni Mubarak.

Straight from his release from 12 days of detention, Mr Ghonim gave an emotionally charged television interview where he sobbed over those who have been killed in two weeks of clashes.

He arrived in the square when it was packed shoulder-to-shoulder, a crowd comparable in size to the biggest demonstration so far that drew a quarter of a million people. He spoke softly and briefly to the huge crowd from a stage and began by offering his condolences to the families of those killed.

“I’m not a hero but those who were martyred are the heroes,” he said, breaking into a chant of “Mubarak leave, leave.” When he finished, the crowd erupted in cheering, whistling and deafening applause.

Mr Ghonim has emerged as a rallying point for protesters, who reject a group of traditional Egyptian opposition groups that have met the government amid the most sweeping concessions the regime has made in its three decades in power.

Protesters have lacked a clear, representative voice and many worry the traditional parties are trying to hijack the uprising, which began when activists used the internet to mobilise protesters. The mostly youthful protesters are insisting that no concessions will do unless Mr Mubarak steps down.

About 130,000 people have joined a Facebook group nominating Mr Ghonim as the spokesman of their uprising. The page is called “I delegate Wael Ghonim to speak in the name of Egypt’s revolutionaries.”

The huge turnout in Tahrir gave a resounding answer to the question of whether the protesters still have momentum even though two weeks of steadfast pressure have not achieved their goal of ousting Mr Mubarak.

Even government employees joined the crowed, including about 5,000 university professors and teachers who failed in an earlier attempt to march on the Interior Ministry, where they were blocked by security.

There were demonstrations calling for the president’s removal around the country as well with 18,000 people cramming into the main square of Egypt’s second largest city in Alexandria.

Some 3,000 service workers for the Suez Canal also demonstrated in Suez city, while 8,000 people chanted anti Mubarak slogans in the southern city of Assuit.

Meanwhile Mr Mubarak’s regime offered more concessions to the protesters in hopes of appeasing them while keeping as firm a grip on power as it possibly can.

Vice president Omar Suleiman, who is managing the crisis, offered to set up committees to propose long-sought constitutional amendments and monitor the implementation of all proposed reforms.

The amendments will include presidential term limits and relaxing eligibility rules for who can run.

Mr Mubarak has refused the protesters’ central demand to step down, insisting on serving until elections in September.

Mr Mubarak also ordered a probe into last week’s clashes between the protesters and government supporters as well as mass detentions of human rights activists and journalists.

The latest government announcement came two days after Mr Suleiman met for the first time representatives of opposition groups, including the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood – the country’s largest and best organised opposition group – to debate a way out of the ongoing political crisis.

The fundamentalist Islamic group issued a statement earlier today calling the reforms proposed so far as “partial” and insisting that Mr Mubarak must go to ease what it called the anger felt by Egyptians who face widespread poverty and government repression.

The Brotherhood also accused pro-Mubarak thugs of detaining protesters, including Brotherhood supporters, and handing them over to the army’s military police who torture them.