Al-Ahram Weekly Issue No. 247 16 - 22 November 1995
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875

Here comes the candidate

By Dina Ezzat

In a country where illiteracy is a chronic problem, candidates are assigned symbols

The 4000-plus candidates in the November elections have to rely largely on banners and posters for publicity: marches and demonstrations are banned, and organising a public rally requires a permit from the security authorities, which, more often than not, is refused.

As a result, millions of banners straddle the streets, supported by wooden poles, and posters and pictures of candidates plaster the walls. Most have a simple message: vote for a certain candidate on 29 November.

There are some variations: "Vote for the man who can help make a better future", "Vote for the man who fears God alone", "Support the honest and articulate candidate", "You honey-people, here comes the right candidate", and "Vote for getting the right man into the right place".

Other banners, mainly put up by opposition candidates, urge the public to vote. "Your duty is to vote. Do not neglect your duty," one of them reads. Another declared: "Vote, for Egypt's sake".
Other slogans may have a nice ring in Arabic but carry an ambiguous political message, like the one that reads: "Enough of what we have had. Gone is the time of forgetfulness."

Apart from the banners put up by independents, slogans reflect party affiliations. To the chagrin of opposition candidates, Cairo's public buses are carrying the slogan of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP): "Yes to the tolerance of Islam. No to violence, extremism and the exploitation of religion." The Islamists' slogan is, by contrast, short and to the point: "Islam is the solution".

And while Wafdist and Nasserist candidates' banners capitalise on the political heritage of their parties, some independents have sought to associate themselves with the NDP. "Vote for the independent candidate who is running according to the principles of the National Democratic Party," reads one banner.

Some opposition and independent candidates have complained of a government-inspired effort to undermine their banner campaigns. They charge that their banners and posters have been repeatedly torn down and that good spots on the streets (not to mention the buses) have been reserved for NDP candidates.

Both the Interior Ministry and the Cairo governorate, which supervise the election campaigns, have denied that they have shown favouritism to NDP candidates. But, insisted Mohamed Abdel-Qoddous, an Islamist candidate running in Cairo's Boulaq district, "They can issue as many denials as they like, but the fact remains that the banners that I keep putting up are systematically disappearing." Conceding that the banners he put up two days earlier were still there, Abdel-Qoddous came back with: "I'm worried that the Cairo governorate labourers who used to pull them down might be ill or something."

Opposition and independent candidates also complain that NDP candidates' banners greatly outnumber their own. They say that any NDP candidate has an average of 1,000 banners and 5,000 posters on the streets of the constituency where he or she is running. And if the NDP candidate is a cabinet minister the number of banners and posters may be doubled or even trebled. Even the most affluent of non-NDP candidates would not be able to afford half this number of banners, they add.

And while some candidates, with large financial resources or well-off supporters, can easily replace their banners and posters, the limited budgets of others deny them this luxury. For many opposition and independent candidates, losing a banner is a serious problem. They use other campaigning methods, such as visiting their constituents in their homes or meeting with them in the coffee-shops. Some hand out leaflets carrying their pictures and a summary of their electoral programme. Others hire night watchmen to guard banners.

Down with the coffee pot

Candidates are assigned symbols to help illiterate voters make their choice

In a country where illiteracy is a chronic problem, candidates are assigned symbols - such as a car, a boat or a clock - to make it easier for illiterate voters to identify their choices on the ballot paper. There are 100 electoral symbols, officially approved since 1984, which the Interior Ministry's election department assigns to the candidates in each constituency.

But while some symbols are easy to identify and remember and may have positive connotations, such as the crescent and camel, others, such as a coffee-pot and a roll of thread have been dubbed unmemorable, or, in the case of the potty and the pistol, down-right negative.

The symbols have a numerical order - the crescent is No. 1 and the camel No. 2 - and are assigned to candidates on a first-come, first-served basis. Opposition and independent candidates claim that the Interior Ministry's election department deliberately abused its power, assigning the "good" symbols to National Democratic Party candidates.

Voters elect two MPs in every constituency. The NDP candidates running for the fe'at (professionals') seats were assigned the crescent while those contesting the peasants'-workers' seats were given the camel. Their opponents, who ended up with such symbols as the spoon or horse shoe, claim the crescent and camel traditionally stimulate a good response from illiterate voters. The fact that NDP candidates throughout the country were given the same symbols, their opponents add, cements the positive image in the voters' minds. Opposition figures argue that it will be easier for an illiterate person to make the connection between the crescent and the camel and fill the first and second circles on the ballot card.

"This has been deliberately pre-arranged," said Yassin Serageddin, spokesman for the Wafd Party. "It is rather hard to believe that all the NDP candidates, in every electoral district in Egypt's 26 governorates, managed to arrive ahead of all other candidates, and arrive at the same time, to get the No. 1 and 2 symbols."

According to Mustafa Bakri, a Liberal Party candidate, the NDP nominates must have been given their symbols before their allocation was officially due to begin. Bakri, who is running in Helwan, said he arrived at the local Security Department at 7am on the day distribution was set to begin. "There was nobody there, but they still told me that the No. 1 and 2 symbols were taken by the NDP, he said.

Even more critical were Islamist candidates who were given such suggestive symbols as the pistol and the sword. "This is unfair," an Islamist candidate said. "The government-controlled media associate us with violence and terrorism and then we are given symbols that are suggestive of killing and brutality." Maamoun El-Hodeibi, spokesman of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, was given a sword, while Adel Hussein, secretary-general of the Islamist-oriented Labour Party was assigned a pistol.

Interior Minister Hassan El-Alfi rejected the complaints as "vicious allegations". Insisting that his ministry dealt fairly with all candidates, El-Alfi said the NDP candidates were given the first and second symbols because they arrived first. In any case, he said, candidates who were unhappy with their symbols had a one-week grace period to have them changed. About 200 candidates requested a change. And with no more than 50 candidates in any one constituency, and over 100 symbols, there should be no problem in getting an exchange.

Many opposition figures believe the system should be reconsidered. They suggest that the candidates of each political party should be given the same symbols throughout the country and that some unsavoury symbols should be omitted altogether. "There is absolutely no need for such symbols as the spoon and the sheep. More appropriate symbols should be chosen," said Hamid Mahmoud, acting secretary-general of the Democratic Nasserist Party.

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