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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Elections for lawyers, doctors on hold
By Mona El-NahhasLawyers are taking the first steps toward re-asserting the independence of the Bar Association, following three years of judicial sequestration. A resolution of the crisis at the 200,000- member syndicate began unfolding in October after the three custodians evacuated their offices and handed over power. They did so -- in compliance with a ruling by the Court of Cassation -- to an interim judicial committee. This committee has been empowered by the court ruling to run the syndicate's affairs until elections for a new council are organised within six months. The grace period will end in mid-April.
Since taking over, the judicial committee has been busy preparing lists of voters in preparation for the elections. Once this task is completed, the committee will accept nominations for the post of chairman and 12 council seats.
Nasserist Sameh Ashour, Wafdist Ahmed Nasser and the pro-government Raga'i Atteya are the main candidates for the post of chairman. During the month of Ramadan, each of the three was keen on meeting with syndicate members at Iftar banquets to expound their electoral platforms. The three agreed on the necessity of restoring the "dignity" of lawyers and paying greater attention to professional, as compared to political, issues.
Nasser said that his platform expands the circle of syndicate services to include medical treatment and housing, as well as an increase of retirement pensions. "We will also provide graduates with legal training in return for reasonable bonuses," he said. "And finally, we will demonstrate a commitment to holding the meetings of the general assembly punctually," Nasser concluded.
Atteya said his priority will be the problems of young graduates who are in need of "real" job opportunities. "It is also necessary to find another building for the syndicate that can accommodate and offer services to 200,000 members," he noted. Atteya said that he will also attempt to get housing units from the Ministry of Housing to be allocated to young lawyers at reasonable prices.
As for Ashour, his priority will be to reform the law regulating the profession.
Some members of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood are planning to contest the elections despite the blow directed against 20 leading Brotherhood figures who are now standing a military trial on charges of seeking to reactivate the group. The 20 include Moukhtar Nouh, treasurer of the association's dissolved council, and Khaled Badawi, his assistant. The two had been planning to contest the forthcoming elections.
Islamist lawyer Fatema Rabie asserted that the arrest of Nouh and Badawi will not force the group to change its position. "The Brotherhood will not be excluded from the elections. Other members will nominate themselves in the place of Nouh and Badawi," she said.
Islamist lawyer Montasser El-Zayyat, a de facto spokesman for the underground Al-Gama'a Al-Islamiya, paid a recent visit to Nouh at Tora prison, south of Cairo. He later quoted Nouh as saying: "If the aim of the trial is to exclude me from the elections, I am ready to drop the whole matter. But it would be extremely wrong to use the trial as a means of scaring away the Islamist trend and excluding its members from syndicate activities."
El-Zayyat criticised the Bar Association's "negative" attitude because it failed to extend support for Nouh and Badawi.
While lawyers may soon be celebrating their syndicate's independence, doctors continue to file lawsuits demanding elections, which were scheduled to be held way back in 1994. Two weeks ago, Hamdi El-Sayed, chairman of the Doctors' Syndicate, filed a third lawsuit with an Administrative Court against Mahfouz Shouman, head of the judicial committee. Under Law 100 of 1993, the committee is in charge of supervising syndicate elections. El-Sayed complained that Shouman's committee had failed to take action for the past six years towards setting an election date.
El-Sayed told Al-Ahram Weekly that he had won two rulings in favour of elections from Administrative Courts in 1996. And yet, Shouman insists on ignoring them. El-Sayed warned that because the legal term of the syndicate council's members had ended a long time ago, the situation at the syndicate is deteriorating. He also attributed this deterioration to the fact that five of its council members are standing military trial in the Brotherhood case.
Two years ago, Shouman formed a three-member committee to revise the lists of voters. But the committee held only one meeting and did not take further action.
