Muhammad Naguib
On 22–26 July 1952, the Free Officers, a group of disaffected officers in the Egyptian army founded by Gamal Abdel Nasser and headed by General Muhammad Naguib, initiated the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 which overthrew King Farouk, whom the military blamed for Egypt's poor performance in the 1948 war with Israel and lack of progress in fighting poverty, disease and illiteracy in Egypt. The monarchy of Egypt and Sudan was gone without "a voice" being "raised" in its favour. In the following two years, the Free Officers consolidated power. Popular expectations for immediate reforms led to the workers' riots in Kafr Dawar on 12 August 1952, which resulted in two death sentences. Following a brief experiment with civilian rule, the Free Officers abrogated the 1953 constitution and declared Egypt a republic on 18 June 1953, Muhammad Naguib as Egypt's first President. Within six months all civilian political parties were banned replaced by the "Liberation Rally" government party, the elites seeing a need for a "transitional authoritarianism" in light of Egypt's poverty, illiteracy and lack of a large middle class.