In December of 2010, Mohammed Bouazizi, a small fruit vender, borrowed about $200 (US) to buy fruit to sell in a hand cart. City officials harassed and beat him for not having a vending permit. Finally, when he refused to pay a bribe, they confiscated his equipment and dumped his fruit into the street. After the local governor refused to hear his complaint, Bouazizi set himself on fire in protest of corruption and oppression in Tunisia.
28 days later, after non-stop protests, Tunisia’s President Zine Ben Ali, stepped down after 23 years in power.
9 days after that, protests began in Egypt. It only took 18 days to dethrone Hosni Mubarek after 29 years in power.
By the time Mubarek left, protests had already begun in Yemen, Syria, Algeria, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Oman, and Saudi Arabia. Within a few months the protests spread to nearly every country in the Middle East and Northern Africa.
Together, people around the region stood up to demand their dignity and basic human rights. Together people called for an end to corruption, abuse of power, rigged votes, and - a new word for me - kleptocracy, which means “rule by thieves.” I remember an interview of a woman in Lybia. The reporter was asking her if she thought the Lybian rebells would be successful. She was adamant that they would be. She kept saying things like, “Ghadaffi has to go,” and “This is the end of all of that.”
The Arab Spring was a tidal wave of hope and urgency that swept through nation after nation where people longed to be free. Although, it is still underway in places like Syria and Jordan, we can see clearly that the Arab Spring has reshaped our geopolitical landscape. They defeated their enemies by joining together in protest. A frustrated fruit vender has toppled a tyrant and changed our world.
But this was not the first Arab Spring.
