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Al-Ahram Weekly 25 - 31 May 2000 Issue No. 483 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 25 - 31 May 2000 Issue No. 483
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Precarious politics
By Khaled DawoudLeaders of the Islamist-oriented Labour Party used to pride themselves publicly that their mouthpiece, the bi-weekly Al-Shaab, was the only opposition newspaper capable of toppling cabinet ministers. Yet when Al-Shaab unleashed a campaign against Culture Minister Farouk Hosni on 28 April, running headlines alleging that a novel re-printed by the ministry insulted God, the Qur'an and Prophet Mohamed, Labour Party leaders seem to have miscalculated the ramifications of their campaign, blinded perhaps by the capital they believed could be made out of it in the upcoming November parliamentary elections.
Opposition sources suggested further that Labour leaders also wanted to convey a message to the government that the imprisonment of Al-Shaab editor, Magdi Hussein, and two other journalists working for the newspaper, had not put an end to the newspaper's favoured tactic of selectively targeting individual government ministers as objects of ferocious attacks. After lashing out against then Interior Minister Hassan El-Alfi in 1996, Al-Shaab has more recently directed its ire at the Deputy Prime Minister and Agriculture Minister Youssef Wali. It described him in front-page headlines as a "traitor" and an "agent for Israel." As a result, the newspaper was convicted of libel and three of its journalists received prison sentences ranging between one and two years.
Undeterred, the newspaper recently launched a fresh campaign against Hosni and other culture ministry officials, condemning them for re-printing the allegedly blasphemous novel A Banquet for Seaweed by Syrian writer Haydar Haydar. Political experts are convinced that the government is not in a position to tolerate any attempt at incitement that may undermine social stability. Consequently, the decision of the Political Parties Committee, a government-controlled body in charge of licensing political parties and overseeing their activities, to effectively freeze the Labour Party's activities and suspend the publication of Al-Shaab came as no surprise.
In 1987, the Labour Party forged an alliance with the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, raising the slogan "Islam is the solution." And in 1989, a general party congress dropped the word "socialist" from Labour's platform.
Meanwhile, the government was experimenting with ways of dealing with the Brotherhood, the nation's oldest and most influential Islamist group. It was understood that while the Brotherhood would not be sanctioned as a legal political party, they would be allowed to act freely as members of existing parties.
The deal fell through in 1995 when the government reached the conclusion that the Brotherhood had failed to "contain" the more militant Islamist groups. Following the Brotherhood's reluctance to condemn Islamist violence in clear-cut terms, the government acted to oppose its presence in professional syndicates, rounded up tens of its members and put tens of others on trial.
Al-Shaab newspaper remained the only mouthpiece for the Brotherhood and other Islamist writers. According to informed sources, the fact that the Brotherhood and Al-Shaab joined forces in the campaign against Haydar's novel resulted in speedy government action against the Labour Party. Al-Azhar University has been a stronghold for the Brotherhood, and a statement from the group condemning the novel was widely distributed, resulting in student-police clashes.
Many intellectuals, though, are concerned that the government's handling of the crisis has given priority to security measures while disregarding the issue of freedom of expression and rejection of censorship by religious institutions such as Al-Azhar.
Intellectuals showed solidarity with two writers, Ibrahim Aslan and Hamdi Abu Golail, who were charged by the state security prosecution with misusing their posts within the Ministry of Culture to re-print Haydar's novel.
In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly, Culture Minister Hosni complained that the government did not speak with one voice during the crisis. He also said that radio and television, in a country where illiteracy stands at 50 per cent, failed to initiate any public discussion of the issue.
Hosni argued that Al-Azhar has no authority to censor literary or art productions. "This is not a religious book. It is not a book on Islamic thought. It is a novel," the minister said.
Prominent columnist Salama Ahmed Salama wondered why the government decided in the first place to refer Haydar's novel to Al-Azhar. "The report made by Al-Azhar gave a big boost to Al-Shaab and may make the public think that the publication of the newspaper was suspended because it defended Islam," Salama told Al-Ahram Weekly.
For many, however, the confrontation underlined the weakness of political parties and the fragility of the nation's 23-year-old multiparty experience. "The existing parties have no democratic structures and never organise democratic elections that might allow the emergence of new leaders," Salama said. "All parties are run by a group of political professionals, whose main interest is to maintain the status quo."
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