PRESIDENT Mohammed Morsi of Egypt has given awards to the nation’s two top military commanders, two days after he ordered their retirement. Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, who ruled Egypt through his military council for 17 months after last year’s popular uprising overthrew longtime President Hosni Mubarak, and his chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Sami Anan, made their first public appearance to receive the nation’s highest medal.
Morsi, who ordered the two to leave their posts and take positions on his advisory council instead, presented the awards.
His decision Sunday stunned the nation. It followed a power struggle between the Islamist president and the powerful military, which indirectly ruled the nation for six decades.
After awarding them the Nile Medal, Morsi met with Tantawi and Anan.
Meanwhile, an Egyptian court is to hear the first legal challenge to a decision by Morsi’s decision to scrap army-imposed curbs on his powers.
The challenge was filed in
Egypt’s administrative court by Mohamed Salem, a lawyer who has previously
sought to have Morsi’s children, two of whom hold Egyptian and U.S. passports,
stripped of their Egyptian nationality.
“He wants to bring back the
totalitarian regime and create a new dictator but from the Brotherhood,” said
Salem, referring to Morsi, told Reuters
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