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Subscribe to RSSUpdate 10:56 a.m. ET: Before he announced his resignation, Badrawi told Bloomberg News that protesters calling for Mubarak's departure had won and that early presidential elections might be coming.
"The revolution has succeeded," Badrawi said in the Bloomberg interview this morning.
"What's the need for events that do not allow for economic development?" he asked. "We want work. We want companies to make profit and pay taxes. We want safety for tourism."
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Hossam Badrawi, the new general secretary of President Hosni Mubarak's ruling National Democratic Party, has resigned, Reuters reports, quoting an interview on al-Hayat TV.
"It's a resignation from the position and from the party," Badrawi said in the interview. "The formation of new parties in a new manner that reflects new thinking is better for society now at this stage."
Badrawi was appointed as secretary-general Saturday in a purge of unpopular figures in Mubarak's party.
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I'm happy for the Egyptian people, even envious...however, the man in charge now worked with the US to waterboard fellow Arabs. Very worrying! I hope this doesn't come back to bite the masses in the nose.
About time. Now comes the hard work of rebuilding the country. The Egyptian people have a long way to go. Freedom is a very difficult thing to keep.
He has saved his country a lot of grief. Now let's see if they can have a peaceful transition, free elections, and get the leader they want and deserve. I have been to Egypt and found these people to be wonderful. May they get what they so desperately want. Their freedom from oppression.
This is good news, but it's a huge concern that, as I understand their constitution, the Egyptians have only two weeks in which to stage an election. Can you imagine trying to do that here? And that's in a stable, first-world democracy that is, contrary to a lot of the huffing and puffing in fora such as these, comparatively free of electoral corruption. Let's all hope they can pull this off without inciting further protest and opposition, and usher in a new era of Egyptian openness and freedom.
The freedom and democracy demonstrators in Egypt's Tahrir Square are finally vindicated as Mubarak resigns. The army and the government refused to shoot and kill their own people unlike the peaceful Tianenmen Square demonstrations in 1989. But time will surely come when the perpetrators of the mass killings in Beijing will be brought to justice.