Only half the story
A surprise announcement indicates that the government may be willing to move towards human rights reform. Gamal Essam El-Din looks at the pros and cons
Gamal Mubarak
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National Democratic Party (NDP) Policy Secretariat chairman Gamal Mubarak, the 39-year-old son of President Hosni Mubarak, made an announcement on 6 March that has inspired quite a bit of fuss, in the media, amongst political pundits and at Parliament. Mubarak proposed breaking two old taboos -- scrapping Law 105 of 1980 on state security courts and abolishing the hard labour penalty enshrined in the penal code -- and also said the Secretariat had decided to set up a "National Council for Human Rights".
Although political pundits hailed the initiatives, most couched their comments with warnings that for any real change to take place, reform must go further.
According to Mubarak, the three proposals are the by-product of a three-month study. "The Secretariat, acting on instructions from President Hosni Mubarak in his capacity as NDP chairman, has been studying these proposals in collaboration with the government and civil society organisations for over three months," Mubarak said, indicating that the proposals would be submitted to parliament once they are drafted in legislative language.
The initiatives made major headlines, due to a combination of factors. Not only did they seem like a new idea that appeared to go against a general tightening up of internal security as regional tension continues to rise, the fact that they were announced by Gamal Mubarak, who heads the ruling party's most influential decision-making body, meant that the chances of the initiatives moving from the realm of rhetoric to law were significant, to say the least.
In fact, government sources immediately indicated that measures had already been taken in that regard. According to Justice Minister Farouk Seif El-Nasr, legal experts are currently in the process of turning the initiatives into a reality before parliament adjourns its current session in early June.
The deeper ramifications of the initiatives, on the other hand, were more of a topic of debate. NDP stalwarts hailed the moves as aiming to make Egypt more democratic. Leading NDP figure Ahmed Abu-Zeid, chairman of parliament's Arab Affairs Committee, said the initiatives are a manifestation of the party's newly-adopted slogan -- "The government is the party's government and not vice versa." Abu-Zeid told Al-Ahram Weekly that the initiatives are "a clear manifestation of the persistence of new reformist trends within the party". Mohamed Moussa, chairman of parliament's Legislative and Constitutional Committee, described them as a much-need balance between the needs of security and democratisation.
Opposition and independent MPs were less sure. Independent MP Adel Eid, a veteran human rights activist, said the real reason for the sudden appearance of the initiatives was to "polish the image of the government and certain leading NDP figures for the sake of the outside world, and especially America". Eid said the move was basically "a hesitant response to international pressure, and has to be followed by many others on the long road leading to a complete and authentic democracy in Egypt."
Eid backed up his claims during a fiery debate with NDP parliamentary whip Kamal El-Shazli, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs, at the assembly on Sunday, by saying that as many as 16 political activists have been detained simply for joining a march protesting America's threats of war against Iraq. The new ideas were ineffective, he seemed to be saying, as long as the government continues to make use of the emergency law's sweeping powers to refer civilians to military tribunals and hold detainees indefinitely without charges.
An infuriated El-Shazli responded by saying, "this is a country where the rule of the law is supreme. This means that demonstrations can not be organised by just anybody or in any place." On the other hand, El-Shazli said, "the Interior Ministry has never used the emergency law to ban demonstrations against the war in Iraq. Take, for example, the demonstration organised by opposition figures on 27 February, and the NDP's 5 March rally of a million Egyptians."
Independent MP Hamdeen Sabahi also told Al- Ahram Weekly that the new initiatives were incomplete as long as they "do not address a basic issue -- abolishing the law of emergency". Sabahi said the initiatives are clearly aimed at wooing America, especially after US President George Bush recently declared his administration's intention to promote democracy in the Middle East, as a foil to extremism. Sabahi said it was quite telling that, "the emergency was extended for three more years just ten days before the initiatives were announced. Isn't that enough evidence that these initiatives are meaningless?" he asked.
According to Rifaat El-Said, secretary-general of the leftist Tagammu Party, abolishing Law 105 of 1980 actually means nullifying half of the emergency law, since the new initiative calls for an end to civilians being sent to trial at Supreme State Security Courts on criminal charges. If the charges stem from violations of the emergency law, however, civilians can still face the State Security Court. El-Said said he wanted the initiative to also include an abolishment of both the emergency law, and the idea of holding military tribunals for civilians.
The NDP's Moussa said that what the initiative does propose -- that is, an end to civilians being sent to trial at Supreme State Security Courts on criminal charges -- is actually very significant, although its appearance was certainly "too late". Referring to failed attempts to extradite businessmen who had fled Egypt after defaulting on loans, Moussa argued that the possibility that these businessmen would be tried before "this exceptional court led many countries to refuse to hand over [those] who had been convicted of looting bank funds."
As for the idea of abolishing the hard labour penalty, Sabahi said that move must also be accompanied by entrusting the Justice Ministry -- instead of the Interior Ministry -- with supervising prisons.
Regarding the proposed new human rights council, Eid suggested that it must include people from differing political currents if it is to be taken at all seriously. "There are serious doubts about this [new council] when such independent human rights organisations as the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR)," Eid said, have been working for over 18 years to expose hundreds of human rights violations in Egypt. According to informed NDP sources, the new council is expected to be affiliated to the People's Assembly, its main task preparing annual reports on human rights in Egypt.
