3 - 9 May 2001
Issue No.532
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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 3 - 9 May 2001 Issue No.532 |
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As the countdown begins for Shura Council elections, the forthcoming poll is being overshadowed by the confrontation between the state and the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. Gamal Essam El-Din surveys the setting and, reporting from the People's Assembly, anticipates the Brothers' revenge
The Brothers strike back
Last week's confrontation between the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood's 17 parliamentary deputies and People's Assembly Speaker Fathi Sorour is expected to escalate in the near future. The Brotherhood's deputies, outraged by a police crackdown on their group's candidates in the Shura Council's mid-term elections, have decided to retaliate by taking the government to task in the People's Assembly. The campaign will take the form of tabling a series of parliamentary questions and "requests for information" to Prime Minister Atef Ebeid and cabinet ministers. These questions and requests will address several matters considered embarrassing to the government, mostly related to religion.At a meeting held on Saturday by the People's Assembly's Defence and National Security Committee, at least 10 of the Brotherhood's 17 deputies insisted that police forces in Al-Sharqiya governorate resorted to arbitrary measures in arresting three group members who planned to run in the Shura Council mid-term elections. [Eleven group members were arrested afterwards in Alexandria]. "This goes against what the political leadership has emphasised many times," Brotherhood MP Mohamed Mursi said. "The leadership has affirmed commitment to broadening the scope of political participation and promoting democratisation. It is deplorable that what we hear on a day-to-day basis completely contradicts what happens on the ground. This breeds a sense of injustice among the masses."
Mursi insisted that the members had committed no offence. "The three men had already registered as candidates in the Shura elections and received fee-payment receipts confirming registration," he said. However, on their way out of the registration offices, Mursi said, one of the three men, Zagazig University's Science Lecturer Sayed Abdellah, was abducted and pushed into a car which drove him to Torah prison, south of Cairo. The other two, both Zagazig University professors, were arrested inside Al-Sharqiya's Security Department and were also taken to Torah prison.
The Brotherhood's deputies tried in vain to raise committee support for a request to examine the candidacy registration books at the Al-Sharqiya Security Department. "This is necessary to ascertain whether or not the three abducted men had already registered for election," Mursi said.
However, committee chairman Fathi Qozman shrugged off the request. "The case is now in the prosecution's hands, and we have to respect the prosecution's decision to take the three men into custody for 15 days pending investigation," he said.
Responding to the Brotherhood's claims, the Interior Minister's First Assistant, Ahmed Khalil El-Sawwan, emphasised that the three men were arrested on the street and by no means in the Security Department. Besides, El-Sawwan added, none of the three men had applied to run in the Shura elections. He explained that an order to arrest them was issued by prosecutors on 18 April and implemented the following day, before any of them applied to run for election. "A security investigation showed that the three men were in possession of leaflets promoting the revival of a secret and unlawful organisation. They also face charges of inciting Zagazig University students to stage anti-Israeli demonstrations," El-Sawwan said.
"The Interior Ministry is very keen not to intervene in the polling process, The election of candidates is left to the completely free will of voters."
This confrontation between the Brotherhood on the one hand, and parliamentary Speaker Fathi Sorour and the Interior Ministry's El-Sawwan on the other, could signal that the group will no longer consider moderating its tone in the Assembly. Since the new parliament was formed five months ago, the Brotherhood's 17 deputies, to the surprise of many, have adopted what they call a policy of "objective opposition" to government policies. Two cases may be cited in this respect. The first is a parliamentary question tabled by Brotherhood deputy Gamal Heshmat on 2 January about the state's publishing three "pornographic" books, which were consequently withdrawn to avoid a potentially damaging public debate. The second was when Brotherhood deputies refrained from objecting to the 22 January government policy statement delivered by Prime Minister Atef Ebeid. To the Brotherhood's deputies, this "objective opposition" was intended to serve as a kind of "truce" between the Brothers and the government. "We wanted to give the impression that the presence of many Brothers in parliament should not trigger excessive fears. Their presence does really go in favour of democracy and not against it, as some would like to claim," Hamdi Hassan, an MP for Alexandria and one of the Brotherhood's deputies, told Al-Ahram Weekly.
Now Heshmat has decided to go forward with questions on what the Brotherhood considers "indecency." In addition to last January's question about "pornographic" books, the question this month concerns the recent staging of the "Miss Egypt" beauty contest. "This contest was organised even though the Grand Mufti stated that there should be a strict ban on this kind of competition. The government claims it is doing its best to fight extremism, but it is this kind of contest, in which 123 Egyptian girls took part, that fans extremism," Heshmat said.
Joining forces with Heshmat on the same front, Mursi directed a "request for information" to Prime Minister Atef Ebeid about a state-owned magazine called Al-Kawakib(The Stars), which publishes "all that promotes immorality among young people," in Mursi's words. He singled out an Al-Kawakibissue devoted to one subject: kissing on the cinema screen.
"It is deplorable that this glaring example of immorality receives funding from the state budget at a time when the Palestinians are facing a war with the Israelis. Public money earmarked for these indecent publications should go instead to generating employment opportunities to young people," Mursi said.
The campaign by the Brotherhood MPs against what they consider to be "indecency" followed not only the confrontation with Sorour, but also another clash, this time with Education Minister Hussein Kamel Bahaeddin. At least five of the Brotherhood's deputies have openly charged Bahaeddin with depending on "malicious information and reports forwarded by the State Security [police]" for reassigning more than 3,000 school teachers to administrative jobs. This action was described by Mursi as a "massacre that triggered horror and dread in the hearts of all teachers."
"How in an Islamic state can schoolmasters be the victims of injustice for the simple reason that they are religious persons, and how can veiled schoolmistresses face arbitrary measures?" Sayed Abdel-Hamid, another Brotherhood MP, asked.
Bahaeddin was quick to respond. "The Education Ministry can never stand idle in the face of the promotion of sectarian strife in schools at the hands of extremist teachers," he said. "The Education Ministry will do everything possible to protect students from those who seek to plant extremist ideas in their minds.
"When individual interest is in conflict with society's interest, it is society's interest that should prevail," he said.
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