The 50-member committee writing a new constitution says a final draft will be ready by next week. “Although we still have time until 3 December we expect to finish ahead of time,” said the committee's media spokesperson Mohamed Salmawy. “The remaining 10 days are crucial. We hope the second reading of the final document will garner consensus and we won't have to resort to the 75 per cent majority vote,” Salmawy told Al-Ahram Weekly. “The vote will be televised live in order to allow the public to follow the discussion of their new constitution minute by minute.” Salmawy told the Weekly the constitution's preamble clearly reflects the principles of the revolutions of 25 January and 30 June by insisting on the separation of religion and politics, strengthening national independence and foregrounding social justice. The post-30 June political roadmap, however, continues to face challenges, not least the repeated threats by the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies to step up protests in order to prevent a referendum on the constitution. “The more there is progress towards achieving the post-30 June political roadmap the more the group and its allies feel isolated and nervous,” says Suez Canal University professor of political science Gamal Zahran. The new constitution, points out Zahran, imposes an outright ban on political parties with a religious foundation, thereby blocking any route for the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies to play a significant role in Egyptian politics. “Some may fear the group might be able to infiltrate political life again but the new constitutional ban will make this unlikely for generations to come,” he says. The Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) — the group's political arm — faces the prospect of being dissolved in February. The Supreme Administrative Court's (SAC) Board of Commissioners recommended on 16 November that the FJP be disbanded after it “formed armed militias in violation of the 1977 political parties law and mixed religion with politics by receiving orders from the supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood”. “It is almost inevitable that the Brotherhood and the FJP be dissolved,” says Zahran. “And unlike in 1948 and 1954 the dissolution will be a result of judicial and constitutional bans rather than an administrative order.” On 23 September a court ruling was issued banning the Brotherhood and any political party or institution or activity emanating from it. The ruling ordered the seizure of the Brotherhood's assets and outlawed any institution connected to it. A committee formed by the Justice Ministry on Saturday began sequestrating the assets of 115 leading Brotherhood officials. The group appealed the 23 September court order but its petition was rejected on 6 November. On Saturday the Brotherhood and its allies invited secular political forces to a national dialogue, and for the first time did not base an initiative on the reinstatement of Mohamed Morsi. Al-Ahram analyst Emad Gad argues the Brotherhood initiative reflects two major developments. “The US administration and the European Union lost interest in the group after their threats to cut aid failed to carry any weight and after the Brotherhood's street violence tarnished its image without changing any of the realities on the ground.” Economic aid from oil-rich Gulf countries and Cairo's recent rapprochement with Russia not only represent a slap in the face for Washington, argues Gad, but give the government a free hand to crush the group. He warns, however, that “after realising more and more that things are not going its way the Brotherhood might change its tactics and resort to new forms of violence.” On Sunday the senior security officer in charge of investigating Mohamed Morsi's escape from Wadi Al-Natroun prison during the heyday of the 25 January Revolution was assassinated. Police Lieutenant Colonel Mohamed Mabrouk was one of the key witnesses against Morsi who faces allegations that he treasonably conspired with Hamas. Mabrouk also played a leading role in rounding up Muslim Brotherhood officials, including its supreme guide Mohamed Badie and deputy supreme guide Khairat Al-Shater. Expert on political Islam Abdel-Rahim Ali told CBC channel on Monday that “Mabrouk was in charge of tracking Morsi and his presidential deputy Ahmed Abdel-Atti's contacts with several intelligence agencies, including the CIA and those of Qatar and Turkey.” “It is too early to give a final say on the assassination of Mabrouk though the assassination bears the fingerprints of the Muslim Brotherhood and its allied Jihadist cells,” says Ali. “The way Mabrouk was assassinated — he was hit by gunmen in a drive-by shooting — is the same method used by Jihad and Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya to assassinate State Security police officers in the first half of the 1990s. The assassination might be intended as a warning not only for state security officers responsible for hunting the Brotherhood's big fish but also for opponents of the group, telling them that from now on they are all potential targets.” Ali voiced suspicion over the fact that Mabrouk was assassinated just as the Muslim Brotherhood and its allies were issuing an initiative for national dialogue. “It is a mixed Brotherhood message: we are ready for dialogue and for assassinations at the same time,” he says. The Brotherhood's threats of violence are not the only potential obstacle standing in the way of completing the 30-June political roadmap. Some articles of the draft constitution may yet fail to win over public opinion. The 50-member committee has faced attacks in recent days for adopting a French-style mixed presidential-parliamentary system. Zahran believes that entrusting a majority party or a party-based political coalition with forming the government could destabilise Egypt for years to come: “We know that it will be difficult for a single political party to win a majority in parliament and this could usher in a period of political instability and weak governments of the type we saw before the 1952 Revolution.” Interim President Adli Mansour's media spokesman and advisor Ahmed Al-Meslimani argued on Monday that it is better for Egypt to adopt an American-style political system “in which the president enjoys considerable powers but faces meaningful parliamentary scrutiny”. Zahran agrees. Egypt, he argues, is in a desperate need of a strong president capable of moving both the political roadmap and economic development forward. “We do not want a Pharaoh. Neither do we want a figurehead president,” he says. Calls for Defence Minister Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi to run for president continue to gain momentum. “Some see him as the only man capable of restoring stability and imposing discipline while moving the country's democratic process forward,” says Zahran. “While a majority of ordinary Egyptians want a strong man like Al-Sisi to be president, American-funded human rights organisations and the Western media will mobilise against it. They will portray it not only as a return to military rule and the police state but as sowing the seeds of future chaos.”
