'Something's gotta give'

Rumours of an "inclination" towards lifting Emergency Law sent confusing signals to Egyptians, reports Amira Howeidy

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Almost two years after the political establishment began adopting calls for reform it is now showing signs of readiness to put its money where its mouth is. Lifting the 23-year-old "state of emergency" appears imminent, or so the public is being informed by anonymous "official" sources quoted in the local press.

The newly formed government-appointed National Council for Human Rights (NCHR) appears involved in this earnest process. While NCHR officials have been quoted as saying that the council was coordinating with the interior and justice ministries in the process of lifting the Emergency Law, Interior Minister Habib El-Adli was quick to snap back that "no such coordination" exists.

Meanwhile unsourced speculation has continued to filter through to the press, asserting that the Emergency Law will be lifted on 24 June. As Al-Ahram Weekly went to press on Wednesday there were assurances that the NCHR will be presenting President Hosni Mubarak with a memo calling for lifting the Emergency Law. It is also predicted that the president would approve the memo and decide to annul the law within 24 hours.

However, this is not the first time that such rumours have spread and gained credence. On the eve of the opening of a government-hyped reform conference in the Bibliotheca Alexandrina in March, rumours spread across the nation about Mubarak announcing the end of Emergency Law in his opening speech. He did not. Despite the vagueness behind the press's claims this time, the climate appears to be different. The frequency of talk about the "inclination" to lift emergency law has been interpreted as a sign that this long-aspired demand of political parties and civil rights groups might in fact be realised.

Yet with nothing to confirm the accuracy of this interpretation, the public is left with some crucial yet unanswered questions: What exactly does an "inclination" mean? Which are the parties involved? And more importantly, how does the word "inclination" translate into meaningful political, legal and constitutional steps?

"This is definitely not a healthy environment," said prominent businessman and parliamentarian for the opposition Wafd Party, Mounir Fakhri Abdel-Nur. "Such serious and fundamental decisions have to be taken by real parties. This has to be discussed with political parties and it should take place inside the parliament which is supposed to be representative of all the political streams in this country, but isn't."

Sceptics of the government's "intentions" are alarmed by this climate. One of them is Mohamed Zarei, director of the Human Rights Association for the Assistance of Prisoners (HRAAP) who said the "inclination" would be "disastrous if it is true". The government "is not ready for the approximately 17,000 political detainees who have been held in prison without charge, some of whose [detentions] date back to 1986", Zarei told the Weekly. "All the government steps in that direction [of political reform] were taken for window- dressing purposes," he said.

If the government was "serious" about those detainees, Zarie argued, it would have gone through the case of each detainee, sorted out their legal status and found a solution for their social and economic problems resulting from years of illegal detention. "To release 17,000 detainees held under the umbrella of Emergency Law, you have to know how you're going to do that -- if you will in fact release them -- and when," he said.

Zarie also expressed concern over the fate of detainees, even under regular laws. "The problem is which laws will you apply [to their cases]? Or what's worse, not apply any laws at all and leave them in a lawless situation which is far more dangerous than their current status." He echoed sceptical views on so-called government "legal manoeuvres" to transfer many of the powers of Emergency Law into ordinary criminal laws. In other words, the state of emergency will go, "but the government will create another one".

Abdel-Nur feels the picture is more nuanced than that. "There is a system that has been functioning almost the same way for the past 52 years. Do you expect it to change ... overnight?" Yet he remains optimistic: "Change will come". He cited domestic and foreign pressure as possible catalysts for change, in addition to the ongoing economic crisis. "The government has to reciprocate."

"We are all getting old and we have to pass the torch to the younger generation. Will this change be for the better or the worse? I don't know. But something will happen," Abdel-Nur said.