With 34 constitutional amendments approved in Monday's referendum the stage is set for yet more legislative battles, reports Gamal Essam El-Din A day after Monday's referendum on the amendments to 34 constitutional articles, proposed in December by President Hosni Mubarak, government officials announced that of those who had gone to the polls 75.9 per cent had voted for the changes. In a televised speech Minister of Justice Mamdouh Marie said that out of Egypt's 35 million registered voters, seven million, or 27.1 per cent, had actually turned out. Reactions to Marie's announcement were mixed. Before leaving for Saudi Arabia to take part in the two-day Arab summit, President Hosni Mubarak said "the Egyptian people were the real winner because the referendum means more democracy and reform." Mubarak vowed that the vote would open the doors for further amendments and legislative reforms. Immediately after the count leaders of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) met to evaluate the party's performance. NDP Secretary-General Safwat El-Sherif insisted the day represented "a major victory for the party," arguing that "the high turnout clearly shows the opposition's call for a boycott had foundered". Voting, he said, was "marked by transparency and integrity". Ahmed Ezz, the NDP's secretary for organisational affairs, claimed the NDP's get-out-and-vote campaign had been successful in persuading many people to vote for the changes, saying "the figures clearly show the NDP's campaign in favour of the amendments had born fruit." Marie's figures, however, were immediately questioned by the opposition and civil society organisations. Mahmoud Abaza, leader of Al-Wafd, said the referendum vote had been manipulated by the NDP and security forces. "Irregularities in the vote were rife, a result of it being conducted without full judicial supervision. The 26 March referendum is likely to go down in history as one of Egypt's most notorious." Abaza, whose party led a campaign against the amendments, said "the 34 constitutional amendments continue to lack popular legitimacy." Rifaat El-Said, leader of the leftist Tagammu Party, said Marie's figures were as pre-cooked as the constitutional amendments had been, while Diaaeddin Dawoud, the leader of the Nasserist Party, suggested the 27.1 per cent turnout figures had been decided well before the poll. Abdel-Wahab Elmessiri, the Kifaya (Enough) movement's coordinator, also accused the regime of vote rigging, citing as evidence "the reports made by foreign correspondents". Civil society organisations also joined the fray. The Egyptian Organisation of Human Rights (EOHR) estimated that only three per cent of the electorate turned out to vote. The EOHR and the Egyptian Association for the Development of Democracy (EADD) both reported a variety of irregularities, the majority occurring at auxiliary polling stations supervised by government and city council employees where "most of the people are NDP members and therefore not impartial". EHOR and EADD both claimed thousands of government employees were bused to voting stations and instructed to vote in favour of the amendments, and complained that their own representatives were prevented from monitoring the poll. NDP business tycoons offered bribes and gifts to people to show up and vote for the referendum, claimed EADD, which reported "some of these businessmen gave strict orders to workers in their factories in industrial cities like 10th of Ramadan and 6th October to vote yes in the referendum." EADD also alleges that senior officials in both the public and private sector made use of company buses and cars to transport workers to vote for the amendments. The National Council for Human Rights (NCHR), led by former UN Secretary-General Boutros Ghali, seemed to uphold some of the criticisms. The NCHR issued a statement saying "voter lists were inaccurate, some civil society monitors were prevented from observing polling stations, local authorities in some provinces organised mass voting, and some electoral officials intervened in the voting process and sometimes filled in ballots". The NCHR estimates that the real turnout was no more than two per cent despite the intensive media campaign, though it did commend the security forces for their keenness "not to intervene in the voting process". Arguments over the accuracy of the figures announced by Marie led opposition figures, independent politicians and judges to demand an official investigation. Mustafa Bakri, a journalist and independent MP, told Al-Ahram Weekly that he has submitted an urgent request to the justice minister asking for an explanation for the discrepancies between his department's figures and those issued by civil society organisations. Sameh Ashour, chairman of the Bar Association and deputy chairman of the Nasserist Party, announced that the Bar Association would launch its own investigation of vote-rigging during the referendum and could well go on to contest the results before the administrative court. The Judges' Club also said judges entrusted by the club to observe voting had witnessed many irregularities. "These will be itemised in a report about the referendum," said the club's deputy chairman Ahmed Saber. Complaints about the conduct of the poll, however, are likely to fall on deaf ears. Mohamed Ragab, the NDP's spokesman in the Shura Council, told the Weekly that "the opposition is powerless to contest the legitimacy of the referendum results." "They have tried to contest the results of elections and referendums on many other occasions and always to no avail," said Ragab. Following the referendum Fathi Sorour, the speaker of the People's Assembly, said the legislative programme will now focus on three draft laws, updating the 1956 law on the exercise of political rights, the 1979 law regulating city councils, and replacing emergency law with new anti-terror legislation. Amendments to Article 179, which opens the door to anti-terror legislation, were among the most controversial of the constitutional changes, with the opposition charging that it will constitutionalise Egypt as a police state. "I think the new anti-terror law will be the focus of yet more battles in the assembly between the NDP and opposition," said Bakri.
