Aswat Masriya surveyed the views of protesters in Tahrir on Friday after president-elect Mohamed Mursi gave a speech and took a symbolic oath before the masses.

Following the speech, Mohamed Ramadan said, “We only await turning these words into actions and delivering these promises.”

“I came from Bani Suef to participate in the million-man protest to demand full power transfer and hear president Mursi’s speech,” Saeed Mahmoud said, adding “Today I saw the image of the late president Gamal Abdel Nasser in the figure of Mohamed Mursi.”

“The speech dispels people’s fears of Mursi’s rule especially since he emphasized his respect for arts and creativity,” Haitham Abdel Hakam stated.

Another demonstrator, Ramy Abdel Hamid, sees that “Mursi tried through his speech today to satisfy all parties; he took an oath before the people today, he will take another before the constitutional court tomorrow and another before the parliament members as well. This points to his political shrewdness.”

Abdullah Barakat from Banha believes that “Mursi emphasized in his speech that Egypt will not turn into another Afghanistan as some say and he will not work on turning it into a religious state.”

Ali Shaltout thinks that “Mursi tried to avoid the mistakes of his first speech” thus this second speech was “revolutionary”.

“Theoretically, the speech is good,” Hassan Mahmoud said, yet he believes that “Mursi’s success in delivering his promises depends on one thing; keeping his distance from the Muslim Brotherhood.”

“Mursi restored prestige to the Egyptians when he said that people are the source of power,” he added.

On the other hand, Moataz Hagras sees that “Mursi openly declared that he will not give up his powers, therefore he will not acknowledge the complementary constitutional declaration. Thus there is an expected clash between him and the military council.”

Hagras called on all political powers to back Mursi in order to extort the powers of the president to eliminate the rule of the military once and for all.

Following the speech, Montasser Abdel Razek said that “Mohamed Mursi is trying to return the favour to the Islamic currents that backed him in the revolution by saying that he will try to free Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman.”

Yet Abdel Razek expressed his fear of the price Mursi will pay to the Islamists after they backed him in the presidential race.

“The best part in Mursi’s speech is Mursi’s emphasis on the rights of the martyrs and the injured,” Abdel Razek added. “We hope these vows become a solid reality.”