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Al-Ahram Weekly 23 - 29 September 1999 Issue No. 448 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 23 - 29 September 1999 Issue No. 448
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Comment Focus Special Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Everyone's shopping list
By Fatemah FaragLike opposition political parties, many among the country's cultural elite hope that President Hosni Mubarak will usher in greater democracy and freedoms in his fourth term. Others demand greater respect for women's and workers' rights, while a newspaper editor says the penalty of imprisonment for publication offences should be deleted from the press law.
"I hope for more democracy, more civil society, an end to the emergency law, younger people in power and a vice-president," said Saadeddin Ibrahim, professor of sociology at the American University in Cairo (AUC) and director of the Ibn Khaldun Research Centre.
The "shopping list", as Ibrahim puts it, pretty much sums up a general attitude among the intellectual elite. Abdel-Moneim Said, the director of the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, added: "I believe the president should use his fourth term to lead a transition to a full-fledged democracy. This will require a serious look at the constitution and laws that are still in force, given the fact that they were passed in the 1960s and '70s and, hence, are against democratisation."
Other intellectuals also underlined the need for legal reform, but from a different perspective. "Our top request is the quick passing of the new personal status law which has been in the making for six years now. We also hope that there will be greater respect for international conventions on women's rights," said Hoda Badran, head of the Arab Women's Solidarity Association.
Badran also said: "Our constitution states that the two sexes are equal in rights and obligations, yet women are deprived of many positions, such as those of judges, governors and university presidents. We hope that Egyptian women will be allowed to occupy all positions in the coming period."
And what about labour issues? "Of course, our first request is the enactment of the draft Unified Labour Law. The Social Securities Law and the Health Insurance Law also need to be revised," elaborated Aisha Abdel-Hadi, a member of the Executive Committee of the General Federation of Trade Unions.
She added: "The policy and philosophy of the president are clear and we are all in agreement with them. For example, the president has made several statements about the social aspect of development and, in his Labour Day speech, supported our request that the Unified Labour Bill be passed as soon as possible. What we need is that those responsible follow up on the president's directives."
Mustafa Bakri, editor-in-chief of the independent weekly Al-Osbou', affirmed a demand often made by journalists. "We hope that provisions which provide for the imprisonment of journalists for publication offences will be deleted from the press law and that state control over the press will eventually be removed. In the meantime, we urge the president to issue a decree ordering the release of our jailed colleagues."
Bakri also took the opportunity to touch on the more general theme of political reform. "We are all looking forward to political reform and this, in my opinion, would require the termination of the state of emergency as well as the revision of the law regulating the activities of political parties. I hope that this reform will also reflect a more pronounced state bias in favour of the dispossessed and a stronger confrontation of corruption," he said.
Other intellectuals have other interests. "We hope that Egypt will be able to resume its cultural role and that there will be policies that support true creativity. Currently there are many challenges," said Gamal El-Ghitani, a novelist and editor-in-chief of the literary weekly Akhbar Al-Adab. "The state of the cinema is an example of the dilapidated conditions of the arts. If it had not been for the 'Reading for All' programme, I think reading and books would have been totally forgotten by people. We need to start producing culture and stop being merely a show-case for it."
The list is challenging, yet hopes are running high and the predominant feeling is that the list is within reach.
"I believe that the president's talk of forthcoming change indicates that the intention to undertake political reform is there," stated Bakri. Said noted that "there are some indications that this will happen. The president has mentioned the issue, not exactly, but enough." El-Ghitani summed it up by saying that "our trust in the patriotism of the president gives us hope that all of this can, and will, happen."
