Although a foregone conclusion, the parliamentary vote for President Hosni Mubarak's proposed constitutional amendments triggered a clash between ruling NDP MPs and opposition and independent deputies, reports Gamal Essam El-Din As expected, the People's Assembly, the lower house of the Egyptian parliament, on Monday approved President Hosni Mubarak's 26 December initiative asking that 34 articles of the constitution be amended. The approval is expected to further polarise the nation into two camps: an NDP seen as determined to monopolise political life, and a depressed opposition unable to change the status quo, and worried about the impact of the amendments. Veteran Speaker of the Assembly Fathi Sorour said the approval had come after the amendments had been subject to seven sessions of intensive debate on Sunday and Monday. While some 315 ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) MPs voted for the amendments, a bloc of 109 opposition and independent MPs rejected them. President Mubarak decided that the amendments be put to a public referendum next Monday. Although it had been announced earlier that the assembly would vote on the amendments last Tuesday morning, sources emphasised that NDP MPs had been informed the week before that the vote would take place on Monday night, and that they would be expected to be in parliament ready to give the thumbs up to the amendments. Business magnate Ahmed Ezz, NDP secretary- general for organisational affairs, played a central role in rallying NDP MPs behind the amendments and quashing the opposition's hopes of scrapping some of them, especially articles 88 and 179 which deal with judicial oversight of elections and combating terrorism, respectively. One hour and a half before the vote at 10.20pm on Monday night, NDP MPs were summoned by Ezz, urging them to come to the assembly in preparation for the vote. The NDP MPs came wearing green banners emblazoned with the words, "Yes for Amendments Aimed at Modernising Egypt." In a big surprise, two NDP MPs, Mohamed Hussein and Taher Hozayen from Upper Egypt, refused to toe the party's line, urging their ruling party colleagues to "clear their conscience of the guilt of approving the amendments". Opposition MPs also took note that the vote would be conducted on Monday night. Having decided to boycott the debate from its beginning on Sunday, they met outside the assembly building to express their stand against the amendments, holding up black banners with the words, "No to the Constitutional Coup." Muslim Brotherhood MPs ventured into the Assembly's hall trying to stop the vote as well. A fistfight between a number of NDP and Brotherhood MPs was narrowly avoided. On Tuesday morning, opposition MPs met outside the assembly building and held a press conference in which they emphasised that "the amendments are a setback to democracy." Police banned some opposition supporters from joining the MPs, sealing off roads leading to the assembly building. The People's Assembly's approval of the amendments comes as a major blow to the opposition, putting an end to the month-long campaign to mobilise the people against them. When the amendments came up for debate on Sunday, a large number of opposition and independent MPs opted for a boycott. Saad El-Katatni, the Muslim Brotherhood's spokesman in parliament, said that the government had seized on the boycott in order to accelerate the debate over the amendments and put them to a vote in a record period of time. "The decision to hold a referendum next week, rather than in the first week of April, also shows that the NDP is keen to take the opposition by surprise and break its solidarity against the amendments," he told the Weekly. The Brotherhood singled out the amendments to articles 88 and 179 of the constitution for particular attack. El-Katatni confirmed that the Brotherhood's position was that these two articles "eliminate judicial oversight of parliamentary elections, open the door for rigging, and direct a blow to basic human rights and public freedoms". The London-based Amnesty International said on Sunday that the proposed amendments, particularly the anti-terrorism statute, will lead to "the greatest erosion of rights in 26 years". Egypt's three main opposition parties -- the Wafd, Tagammu and Nasserist -- also sniped at the amendments, agreeing that "Monday is a black day in the history of Egypt and a funeral for democracy." In the first day of debate on Sunday, the assembly held three sessions in which 20 of the amendments were approved. A new first article to the constitution was also introduced, in which the principle of citizenship and national unity was introduced to replace the old socialist principle that based Egypt's political system on "an alliance of the people's working forces". Mostafa El-Fiki, chairman of the assembly's foreign affairs committee, said that "this new principle means that all Egyptians -- be they Muslims or Christians, poor or rich, women or men -- are now entitled to enjoy equal rights as long as they are born in Egypt." Article 5 banning the formation of parties based on religion was also approved on Sunday, and the assembly approved the amendment of nine articles that had referred to "socialism" as the "economic foundation of Egypt". Amal Othman, chairwoman of the assembly's Legislative and Constitutional Affairs Committee, argued that "the elimination of the 'socialism' articles moves the economy a step forward and helps Egypt integrate into the global market." The controversial amendment to Article 88 of the constitution came on the second day of debate. Mohamed Dakrouri, an appointed MP and President Mubarak's legal advisor, said the new draft of this article would put an end to the complete judicial oversight of elections and make it a rule that they must be held on one day. However, Mahmoud Abaza, leader of the opposition Wafd, said that "the cost of eliminating full judicial supervision would be very high for the opposition and the majority parties alike. We will be back to the age of stuffing boxes with votes in auxiliary polling stations in favour of the NDP, not to mention other public rigging practices that were the hallmark of elections in the 1990s," he said. The opposition's anger at the approval of the amendments is not expected to prevent the government from putting them to a public referendum next week. NDP sources indicated that the party's provincial offices will be mobilised to organise rallies in favour of the amendments. Police forces were also instructed to stand against public rallies that the opposition might organise against the referendum. "In this way," said an NDP source, "the moves against the referendum will be just confined to the opposition's offices without leaving any impact on the street." The opposition argues that the referendum was decided one week earlier so as not to allow them enough time to hammer out a strategy aimed at persuading voters to oppose them. Sources said the referendum date was decided for next Monday because President Mubarak has a very busy schedule after 26 March, with his planned attendance of a two-day Arab summit meeting in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on 28/29 March. In addition, the People's Assembly and Shura Council, the consultative upper house of parliament, are due to discuss several laws flowing from the new constitutional amendments, as well as an amendment to the 1956 law on the exercise of political rights. Amending this law will open the way to conducting next April's mid-term elections of the Shura Council in one day, without the need for full judicial supervision.
