Al-Ahram Weekly Issue No. 240 28 Sept. - 4 Oct. 1995
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875

Parties count their cards

By Omayma Abdel-Latif

Political parties have begun drawing up their campaign strategies for the November elections, planning how best to draw on their traditional areas of support, and, in some cases, how to win over new sections of society.

A survey has shown that there were 16 million registered voters in 1990, only 26 per cent of the population, while those who actually voted in elections did not exceed 15 per cent.

"There are many factors which determine the voter's choice of a candidate," explained Maj. Gen. Kamal El-Qadi, the researcher who carried out the survey. To gain support from the few who do turn out at the polls, he pointed to distinguished social status in a candidate's home constituency, a good reputation, family connections and services extended to constituents in the past as the qualifications likely to bring success at the polls. The candidate's platform and his parliamentary expertise, he concluded, were of little importance.

In November's elections the Wafd Party will target the Coptic vote, the Nasserist and Tagammu parties the working classes, while the Labour Party will maintain its alliance with the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood. The ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), on the other hand, says it will rely on its selection of "good candidates" - those with good reputations and political expertise, rather than targeting any particular group.

"People always say that the NDP doesn't choose good candidates and this has put us in situations where our MPs turned out to be drug traffickers or corrupt officials," said Ali Shamseddin, chairman of the NDP's youth committee in Cairo. "This time, we want to regain the voters' confidence."

The next few years, Shamseddin said, will be crucial because they will witness the final stage of economic reform as well as the forging of peace treaties in the region. "This requires candidates with political awareness," he said. "But in addition to nominating big names, we need people who know how to get on in parliament and how to play their best cards in the election campaign."

According to Mayo, the NDP's weekly mouthpiece, 30 per cent of the NDP's candidates will be "new faces who will inject new blood into the party and produce new ways of thinking." And to remain in tandem with the shift to a market economy, some of them are business magnates.

"They are part of society and they are playing a major role in the development process; therefore, we need their input in parliament," Shameseddin said, adding that the NDP "is keen that our candidates will represent all walks of Egyptian life, including women, Copts and young people," rather than just one section of society.

The NDP plans to contest the election in all 222 constituencies - a feat which no opposition party, with the exception of the Wafd, can match. And Kamal El-Shazli, the NDP's assistant secretary-general, announced on Monday that the ruling party will nominate 444 candidates, two in each constituency.

Meanwhile the Wafd Party is hoping to win a significant segment of the Coptic vote by including 70 Copts among its candidates, chosen not simply because they were Copts, insisted party assistant secretary-general Ibrahim Abaza, "but because they fit very well in their constituencies and have grassroots support." The trend of nominating Copts runs deep in the party's history, Abaza added.

Surprisingly, the Wafd, champion of a liberal economy, have only a few businessmen on their candidates' list. However, along with the professors and lawyers, a few working class figures are running for the party in this election. "This is one area we have never ventured into in the party's history," said Abaza. "But the time is right now, because we plan to defend workers' rights and to make sure they are not lost in the name of liberalisation."

The leftist Tagammu Party has nominated 40 candidates so far, under the slogan of national unity - something the party is particularly stressing in Upper Egypt, according to the party's deputy leader Lutfi Waked. "We have a Coptic candidate in Al-Minya," he said. "We are telling the people that we are neither with the government nor with the terrorists. We are coming out with a new policy and a new vision."

Tagammu is presenting voters with :a platform that offers solutions to all the problems of Egyptian society," said Waked. "We don't exaggerate or claim false victories; we will be honest and straightforward with the voters."

Along with Tagammu, the Democratic Nasserist Party is pursuing the working class vote. "The concerns of farmers and workers will figure prominently on the party's electoral agenda," party leader, Diaeddin Dawoud, confirmed. "This is where we fight our battle against the NDP. We are trying to defend and protect the gains achieved by the working class in the 1952 Revolution. These gains are being undermined by the NDP."

Meanwhile, Ibrahim Shukri, leader of the Islamist-oriented Labour Party, said that despite the government's clamp down on the Muslim Brotherhood, his party will continue to ally itself with Brotherhood figures who "enjoy massive support in their constituencies". Asked if the alliance would continue to use the slogan "Islam is the solution," Shukri said that voters aspiring for political and economic reform "will resort to Islam as the best alternative".

Shukri added: "This time, we don't want people who will sit on the back rows. The forthcoming period is crucial and we need a strong opposition. We need a parliament that will no longer pass unwanted laws. We don't need MPs who bribe their way into parliament... All opposition parties should work to achieve this goal."

Entrepreneurs run both ways

By Gamal Essam El-Din

At least a dozen businessmen are planning to contest the elections for the next parliament - which is expected to sanction the switch to a fully-fledged market economy. Some of them, mostly those belonging to the official community of businessmen's associations and chambers of commerce, will be nominated by the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). But other businessmen, who have been investigated or prosecuted for corruption-related charges, are also hoping to make it to parliament, either by running as independents or for an opposition party.

The amendment of a 1956 law on the exercise of political rights made it easier for such businessmen to run for parliament. Previously, the Socialist Prosecutor-General could have objected to their nomination, but the amendment stripped him of this power.

According to independent Kamal Khaled, these businessmen "were formerly members of the NDP or were closely associated with it. But the NDP dropped them after they were prosecuted for shady financial practices. Now they are back in the political arena, determined to challenge the NDP and seek parliamentary immunity and political clout."

For these businessmen, Khaled said, a seat in parliament is "an easy and speedy way to get bank loans, buy state land and meet with ministers in search of business opportunities."

Businessman Ibrahim Kamel, who was stripped of his immunity three times during the last parliament, is planning to run in the constituency of Menouf in the Menoufiya Governorate as an independent, challenging a formidable foe - the NDP's assistant secretary-general, Kamal El-Shazli.

Kamel, previously a member of the NDP, quit the ruling party in 1992, following a disagreement over the NDP's list of candidates in local council elections. Kamel then joined the Green Party and led a victorious battle against the NDP in the local council elections.

Meanwhile, El-Shazli has warned that his constituents "would not allow outsiders who had amassed riches illegally to represent them in parliament."

Kamel's first suspension occurred in relation to his involvement in banking activities in Kuwait, the second when he and his bodyguards ransacked the contents of a ground floor shop in his apartment building in Giza and the third was related to the building of a marina on the Nile near the Cairo Sheraton without the approval of the Ministry of Irrigation.

Another challenger to the NDP, this time in Alexandria, is Rashad Osman, who began his career in 1974 as a dock worker on a daily wage of 30 piastres. By the time he was referred for investigation by the Socialist Prosecutor-General in 1981, his wealth had reached LE300 million.

Osman, who was head of the NDP's Alexandria branch, was accused of drug trafficking, smuggling, monopolising the timber trade and expropriating state lands. He was imprisoned for a year and his wealth was sequestered.

Osman staged a political comeback last year when the seat for Mina Al-Basal became vacant after the death of its MP. Osman ran against the NDP candidate, but failed to win the seat.

Ahmed Khairi, the NDP secretary-general for Alexandria and himself a businessman, claimed Osman had spent around LE5 million in his attempt to win the by-election. If he makes it to the next parliament, Khairi said it would prove that the Assembly was open to "corrupt people who acquired their wealth through shady practices.

"The most important thing to stress is that membership of the NDP should be given only to honest businessmen who are committed to the party's principles, who made their wealth by open and fair practices and who really contributed to socio-economic development plans," Khairi said. "The NDP should take a lesson from the past and purge itself of the opportunists who have distorted its image."

Businessmen on the NDP's list of candidates are highly educated, genuinely enlightened and have good reputations, Khairi continued. They include Abdel-Fattah Diab (in Aga, Dakahliya Governorate), a co-owner of a land reclamation company involved in exchanging agricultural expertise with Israel, Mamdouh Thabet Mekki (in Old Cairo), vice-president of the Egyptian Federation of Industries and chairman of the Chamber of Leather Industries, Abdel-Hamid Barka (in Sharqiya), a board member of Misr Romania Bank, Kamal Abul-Kheir (Mehalla Al-Kobra), owner of a tourism company that cooperates with a tourism company that cooperates with Israeli counterparts, and Abdel-Sattar Eshra, board member of the General Union of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce.

One prominent businessman who turned down nomination by the NDP is Mohamed Abul-Enein, owner of a ceramic-manufacturing company. In his opinion, businessmen seeking a seat in parliament will have to devote most of their time to parliament at the expense of their businesses. Moreover, he said, "I am strongly convinced that certain current policies run counter to economic liberalisation and private enterprise. This is why I'm afraid to say that most businessmen who want to enter parliament are either seeking political power or parliamentary immunity." On the other hand, he stressed that parliament needed "enlightened businessmen," even if only to contribute to debating additional economic liberalisation laws.

Yassin Serageddin, spokesman for the Wafd Party, said his party's list of candidates will include five "millionaire" businessmen who will expound the Wafd's position on economic liberalisation in the next parliament. They include George Saad, a Coptic millionaire who was formerly under-secretary at the Finance Ministry, who established a consultancy office for real estate sales after his retirement.

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