Ahmed Orabi - Protest Against Tewfiq

Protest Against Tewfiq

He was a galvanizing speaker. Because of his peasant origins, he was at the time, and is still today, viewed as an authentic voice of the Egyptian people. Indeed, he was known by his followers as 'El Wahid' (the Only One), and when the British poet and explorer Wilfrid Scawen Blunt went to meet him, he found the entrance of Orabi's house was blocked with supplicants. When Khedive Tawfiq issued a new law preventing peasants from becoming officers, Orabi led the group protesting the preference shown to aristocratic officers (again, largely Egyptians of foreign descent). He and his followers, who included most of the army, were successful and the law was repealed. In 1879 they formed the Egyptian Nationalist Party.

He and his allies in the army joined with the reformers, and with the support of the peasants launched a broader effort to try to wrest Egypt and Sudan from foreign control, and also to end the absolutist regime of the Khedive, who was himself subject to Anglo-French control under the rules of the Caisse de la Dette Publique. The revolt spread to express resentment of the undue influence of foreigners, including the predominantly Turko-Circassian aristocracy.