Hamadi,
         You have raised some very interesting scenarios, relative to a power
vacuum should the above mentioned subject materalized. However, we need to
recognize the fact that, nobody has the right to govern anybody. The right to
govern is a collective imperative, that people willingly surrender, to
establish the basis for a constitutional arrangement. As such, the people
enetered into a contract with other citizens, and choose those whom they have
empowered to govern them. They also maintain the right to revoke this
empowerment to govern, whenever a government doesn't serve the interest of
the people.

     There should be a mutual responsibility between those who govern, and
those who are being governed, which should be cherished and respected. When a
government feels that it nologer can serve the interest of the people, it is
noble for such a government to give back power to the people who owns it.
When there is a breach of responsibility on the part of a governing body, the
people have the right to revoke their authority to govern, and transfer it to
another body they have so chosen.

    The misguided response of a government, when the people have determined
to revoke its authority to govern, and blatantly refuse to surrender power,
is the consequence of most of the catastrophic and fatal conflicts that are
evident all around us.

   This situation gives rise to the question that is always being asked. What
happens if a government, contravenes the rights of the people to revoke its
authority to govern, and chooses instead to impose its will, its power, on
the people? Thus the notion that the popular will of the people, through
elections, cannot supplant a government that wants to maintain its power by
all costs. Arguably too, the notion that a government that wants to
consolidate itself in power, against the wishes of the people, must be
removed by all means necessary.

   In the first instance, a government that choose to govern a people that
has already revoked its authority to govern, is only creating a situation of
ungovernability. Hence a government must adhere strictly to the popular will
of the people. Such a government should not try to rigg elections to stay in
power; such a government should not try to manipulate adversely the outcome
of an election that is contrary to the popular wishes of the people. Such a
government should be imbued with a patriotic desire, to surrender power
graciously to the people who owns it. This is a noble act; this is a
patriotic act. The will of the people must always prevail.

  In the second instance, the notion that a govern that wants to consolidate
itself in power, against the wishes of the people, must be removed by all
means necessary, is only relevant to the contractual basis of a
constitutional arrangement; as such, the collective actions of the people,
through civil disobedience, the engendering of an ungovernable situation,
mass demonstrations and strikes, could cause a government to surrender its
illegitimate authority to govern by resigning, and return the authority to
empower to govern back to the people. If by all means necessary, is within
this context,
it is a right that the people not only possessed but can exercise.

  In the final analysis, the people will always truimph. No instrument of
coercion, suppression, brutality and savagery, can break the will of a people
who are determined to be free; a people who are determined to guide their own
destiny.

    Rene

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