ALEXANDRIA: Presidential hopeful Abdel Moneim Abol Fotoh criticized Tuesday calls to draft the constitution and hold the presidential elections parallelly, suggesting that the constitution be drafted after the elections since choosing the constituent assembly will take time. Abol Fotoh said in a lecture titled "What next a year after the revolution?" at the Faculty Club in Alexandria that the constitution should be consensual, wondering why calls are adamant on "drafting the constitution under military rule since the process of forming the constituent assembly needs six months and another six months to leave room for public debate." Abol Fotoh warned from attempts "to make presidential elections hollow to produce another Hosni Mubarak," urging the ruling military junta not to "intervene in the elections and become a political player in it as they should be unbiased and neutral with all presidential candidates." "This is very dangerous for the revolution. The most honorable mission of the army is to protect the country as it is not the role of the army to do any civilian tasks," he said. He added that economic and security challenges require holding presidential elections as soon as possible, rejecting calls to form a civilian presidential council or handing over powers to the parliament. The former leader in the Muslim Brotherhood group asserted that the solution is to immediately open the space for registration right after the end of the Shoura Council elections, and to postpone the process of drafting the constitution after the elections. He pointed out that the powers of the president are specified in the constitutional declaration, disproving allegations that the upcoming president will have absolute powers in the declaration during drafting the constitution, referring to "transitional articles" to regulate the current status quo while drafting the constitution. He also criticized immunity given to the decisions of the Supreme Commission for Presidential Elections against appeals. The commission is formed by the country's top judges and its decisions cannot be appealed by lower-ranking judges. Abol Fotoh said that this article of the presidential elections law violates a premiere principle of human rights which is the right to appeal to courts and represents "a call for violence." He said that it could be revoked only through a referendum. The presidential hopeful supported a political system merging the presidential and the parliamentary systems as the latter requires a strong parties system and the former "is a formula to produce dictators" in Egypt. He rejected giving any political immunity to members or state institutions, saying that a "safe exit" means that anyone is above prosecution. "Honorable and fair exit does not mean that anyone will be above the rule of law or that we will go back to Mubarak's era," he said. "If [justice was served] against those who killed our sons on Jan. 25, no one would have died after that," he said. Attendees chanted against the military rule during the lecture before Abol Fotoh responded saying "They cannot continue and the people will not let them continue," calling on the attendants to communicate with the masses and urge them not to vote for the remnants of the old regime. "There are warning signs from the presidential elections," he said, adding that the revolution should stay peaceful to encounter the conspiracies inside and outside the country to abort it. He described those chanting against the military rule as "patriotic and care about the country" saying that he is the first one who wanted the ruling military council to leave according to the preset schedule, criticizing at the same time attempts to drag the transitional period by dragging the elections. He expressed discontent at the need to protest and exert pressure to achieve the demands of the revolution. “No blood to be shed every time we need a step to be taken," he said. "All those who spread chaos are the organized group of thugs by Mubarak not the youth. Problems that we face like inflation and corruption are a result of 30 years of corruption in addition to the mismanagement over the past year." Abol Fotoh asserted that all non-governmental organizations (NGOs) need to work according to the law and in transparency, referring to the legal probe against the alleged foreign funding of the foreign NGOs in which 44 Egyptian and foreign workers were referred to criminal court. He criticized the attention on the US military aid asserting that the "US will never pay money unless it serves its interests as it is the first one benefiting from this aid," saying that Egypt should not be grateful to anyone "because it is bigger than this." He asserted that choosing his vice will be according to the qualifications not according to electoral calculations, rejecting calls to appoint two vices – one woman and one Copt – as he believes he will not be "two-faced to win votes." He accused an assistant of one of the competing presidential hopefuls, without mentioning names, of fabricating a video of him in which he appeared calling Palestinians to "coexist with Israelis." He asserted that the Palestinian issue is not a conflict between Palestine and Israel but an issue of "Egyptian national security." Abol Fotoh then expressed sorrow over the death of sarcastic writer Galal Amer, deeming him "a great national value that Egypt lost."
