Collision course

The justice minister's suspension of funds to judges' clubs is the latest act in an ongoing saga, writes Mona El-Nahhas

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Mamdouh Marie

Mamdouh Marie's appointment as justice minister last August led many to conclude that a heightening of tensions between the government and judges clubs was inevitable.

Marie's actions since taking the post have done nothing to dampen such expectations. The minister's most recent move in the escalating conflict was to order the state-appointed heads of first- degree courts to set up health and social service provision for members in what judges' are interpreting as an attempt to undermine the role of their own clubs.

"The aim is to undermine judges' clubs and disrupt the unity of judges," Hesham Geneina, secretary-general of the Cairo Judges Club, told Al-Ahram Weekly. Geneina, though, doubts such tactics will work, arguing that the newly-established bodies will never be able to replace judges' clubs as an impartial advocate of the interests of their members.

Alongside moves to provide alternative services Marie also seems intent on attacking the clubs financially and the annual subsidy paid by the ministry to judges clubs has been suspended. The suspension has led the State Council Judges' Club to seek a meeting with Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif in order to clarify the situation.

The ministry's annual financial allocations are the major source of funding for the clubs.

Last week the Egyptian Alliance for the Development of Democracy -- an umbrella grouping of nine NGOs working in the legal field -- warned the ministry against using its annual subsidies as a way of pressuring judges. "The independence of the judiciary is a red line which should not be crossed," it said in a statement.

Given his confrontational style few judges have been surprised by Marie's refusal to even respond to invitations to meet with representatives from the judges' clubs. The minister, most members of the judiciary believe, has already made up his mind, and since his appointment in the summer has been determined to use his position to settle old scores.

Marie's relationship with the judges' clubs has not been a happy one. During the course of last year's presidential elections, when Marie was head of the Supreme Electoral Commission (SEC) charged with putting regulations for the whole electoral process, spats between the SEC and reformist judges were an almost daily occurrence, with judges charging that the regulations laid down by the SEC would fail to guarantee a fair poll. Yet throughout the dispute Marie refused to meet with his critics and attempted to exclude reformist judges from any supervisory role in last year's election.

Undeterred, the judges' clubs played a central role in exposing the electoral fraud that marred both the presidential and parliamentary polls. A fact-finding committee was established by the Cairo Judges' Club to monitor any infringements. Its report is due to be presented to judges during their general assembly scheduled for 17 November.

One of the most flagrant examples of vote-rigging contained in the report occurred in the Giza constituency of Dokki where the NDP candidate Amal Osman was named the winner. Yet according to the committee's findings Osman secured just 4337 votes while Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, her Muslim Brotherhood rival, won 7414.

The kind of allegations contained in the report will entrench the conflict between the government, represented by Marie, and the judges. The assembly will also see judges debating their own recommendations for the constitutional amendments that are at the core of the government's legislative programme for the coming year.

In addition the assembly will now have to discuss ways of dealing with the financial position of judges' clubs following the freezing of their annual remittances from the ministry, and will attempt to devise a strategy to deal with a minister whose hostility to reformist judges is hardly a secret.

"The justice minister should act as a mediator between the judiciary and the government. His failure to do so will serve neither the government nor the regime but will instead widen the confrontation between the executive and judicial branches," says Geneina.