Nightly News   |  February 11, 2011

After the celebration, the transition

NBC's Richard Engel looks ahead to the economic realities that a free Egypt will face after the jubilation dies down.

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This content comes from Closed Captioning that was broadcast along with this program.

>>> there in the arms. you can't celebrate without the rooster. wow.

>> you see richard engle smiling from ear to ear much but he doesn't cover many stories that allow that as our chief foreign correspondent spending so much time in iraq and afghanistan. richard is back with us live from the crowd there in cairo. richard , such a night of celebration, yet almost like new year's eve. the sun comes up tomorrow, the bills come payable. who's running the place? are there police on the streets? will the airport authority keep running? what governs egypt tonight and going forward?

>> reporter: well, right now nothing is governing this country. they are expecting a statement from the military. oh, my, everyone got silent all of a sudden. they are expecting a statement to call on people to return to their jobs, to return to their normal lives. egypt desperately needs to regain its economic credibility. it needs tourists to start returning. so in the next 48 hours or so, i think we're going to hear a series of statements from the military and try and allow this country to get back on its feet, brian.

>> in the seconds we have left here, and then what happens? do they schedule a special election ?

>> reporter: what we're expected to see is a military, once this dies down, will cancel the emergency law, that martial law . once that law is lifted, political parties here can organize and political parties can then prepare for a new election.

>> amazing. what a day and what an end at least to this period of the 16 days you've spent on the ground there. richard engle