Head of the Supreme Constitutional Court Adly Mansour was sworn in as the country’s interim president on Thursday morning, a day after Mohamed Morsi’s year-long presidency was abruptly ended following four days of mass protests calling for his ouster.
Speaking after the ceremony, Mansour saluted the Egyptian people, the Armed Forces, the judiciary, the police and the media.
The position had been bestowed upon him by the Egyptian people, “the source of all powers after rectifying the trajectory of their glorious revolution on January 25, 2011,” he declared.
The Muslim Brotherhood is welcome to “be integrated into this nation” and to help to “continue building” it, Mansour continued, according to the Turkish Anadolou news agency.
“(There will be) no exclusion of anyone,” he said.
The interim president asserted that he was looking forward to quickly holding another round of presidential and parliamentary elections that would reflect “the real will of the people, not a forged one,” according to footage aired live on the private satellite channel ONTv.
“This is the only safe entrance to a brighter tomorrow that allows for wider freedoms, a better democracy and more justice,” Mansour declared.
“The best thing that happened on June 30 is that it brought together all Egyptians without any divisions or discrimination,” he said, referring to nationwide demonstrations called for by the grassroots Tamarod (Rebel) campaign, whose members collected millions of signatures as they petitioned for Morsi’s removal and early presidential elections.
Mansour, a graduate of the Cairo University Faculty of Law, ascended to the helm of the Egyptian state only two days after becoming the head of the SCC, according to the daily independent Al-Masry Al-Youm. The 67-year-old judge is Egypt’s second interim president. Soufi Abou Taleb held the position for eight days in October, 1981, in the aftermath of former President Anwar El-Sadat’s assassination, before Hosni Mubarak was voted into office through a referendum.