Mona El-Nahhas looks at the latest problems beleaguering the Ghad Party Last Friday's elections for the chair of the Ghad Party saw Ihab El-Kholi emerge as front-runner. El-Kholi, previously the chairman of the Ghad's political bureau, won 218 votes. He was followed by Wael Nawwara who won 202 votes. A third candidate, Ahmed Saqr, secured only eight votes. Under the Ghad's election rules, the successful candidate must win 50 per cent, plus one of all votes cast. "I have asked for a re-run to ensure that the next party chairman has the support of a clear majority of members," Nawwara told Al-Ahram Weekly. Nawwara, who resigned four months ago from his post as secretary-general in protest at the way the party was being administered by the higher committee, said that he would abide by whichever decision the party eventually reached. Unlike Saqr, who claimed that elections were rigged, he said he had no questions as to the probity of the vote. Immediately following the count Saqr accused Gamila Ismail -- the party's deputy chairman and wife of its founder , who is currently serving a five-year jail term on forgery charges -- of backing El-Kholi and rigging the vote. Saqr has already submitted a petition to the Shura Council's Political Parties Committee contesting the results. Earlier, on the day of the elections, he filed a complaint at the Qasr Al-Nil Police Station, claiming the names of El-Kholi's supporters appeared several times on voter lists, while his own supporters' names were omitted. Saqr has also alleged that many of those who voted for El-Kholi were not full party members. Human rights activist Ahmed Fawzi, who helped supervise the election along with representatives from eight NGOs, says Saqr's claims are nothing more than sour grapes. "The electoral process was really unique. Glass ballot boxes and phosphorous ink were used in voting. Compared with other political parties, I think the electoral experiment at the Ghad was successful," Fawzi told the Weekly. Ismail, too, denies any impropriety. Saqr, she said, had rushed to the police station to file his complaint even before the vote had commenced. "It would seem," she said, "that he had a security- planned agenda." "I don't know what he is arguing about. He got just eight votes. I don't think when he decided to run in the elections he ever expected to win. It looks like he was ordered to take part just to cause trouble," says Fawzi. El-Kholi has pledged that the moment Nour is released he would quit in the former leader's favour. Meanwhile, he says, he remains committed to refining the party's position on constitutional amendments and furthering coordination with other opposition parties ahead of Shura Council elections. Nawwara has said that should a rerun be called and he emerge the winner his priority will be to amend the party's internal statutes and restructure its governing bodies. In a party deriving its strength and popularity mainly from Nour's political charisma, it would not be easy for anyone else to occupy his seat. This may be why former diplomat Nagui El-Ghatrifi, who succeeded Nour following his imprisonment in December 2005, declined to run in the party's last elections. In the absence of its founder, it was also logical for the party to lose its original appeal. This week, Ahmed Abul Ela, a leading member of the party, threatened to resign, protesting against Ismail's administrative handling of the party. "Ismail keeps everything in her own hands and runs the party as if it were her own property," Abul Ela has claimed. The Ghad Party, despite only being founded in 2004, has already suffered a number of internal splits. Days after Nour came second to President Hosni Mubarak in the September 2005 presidential poll, his leadership was challenged by his deputy, Moussa Mustafa Moussa, and three other members of the party's higher committee. Moussa and his supporters were denounced by Nour as state agents. They still managed to attract a few dozen supporters from within the party, and continue to produce a newspaper, Al-Ghad. While no accurate figures for the paper's circulation are available it is thought to be extremely limited.
