The People's Assembly and Shura Council are currently tackling major legislative and constitutional reforms, reports Gamal Essam El-Din The People's Assembly and Shura Council were this week busy discussing a new legislative and constitutional reform agenda based primarily on President Hosni Mubarak's election campaign platform. The legislative agenda includes political reform laws dealing with judicial sovereignty, publication offences, and remand-in-custody regulations. Parliamentary discussions of these crucial draft bills will take at least one month, up until the second week of July. The submission of the above laws to parliament was adopted under the instructions of Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif. Justice Minister Mahmoud Abul- Leil said the laws dealing with judicial sovereignty and publication offences will be submitted to parliament in the next few days. As for the bill regulating remand-in-custody, Minister of State for Parliamentary and Legal Affairs Moufid Shehab said it had already been submitted to parliament. Shehab said the third law was aimed at reinforcing respect for human rights. "At present," said Shehab, "there is arbitrary use of the remand-in-custody law in the form of detaining citizens for indefinite periods of time and stripping them of any compensation, even if they are later acquitted of charges." Shehab said the proposed draft puts restrictions on the use of remand-in-custody rights and seeks other options such as ordering defendants not to leave their homes or visit police stations every day. "All of these serve as good alternatives to the remand-in-custody option," said Shehab. Abul-Leil said the new law would oblige the prosecutor-general to give reasons for remanding citizens in custody. It would also give citizens the right to appeal against the remand-in- custody decision. Differences emerged during the discussion of the new remand-in-custody law in the legislative committees of both the Shura Council and the People's Assembly (PA). Members of the committees objected to the maximum period of remand-in-custody being six months. In the Shura Council, members asked that the right of remanding into custody be exclusively confined to top prosecutors. In the PA, MPs asked that the remand- in-custody period would not exceed four months in felony cases and six months in criminal cases. Deputy Justice Minister Sirri Siam, however, rejected the MPs' request, insisting that the six- month period applies to the two cases. "This period is necessary to keep a balance between the freedoms of citizens and the necessities of investigation and safeguarding the security of society," Siam said. Meanwhile, the PA decided that a three-member committee be formed to investigate the constitutional reforms proposed by MPs. The committee will be headed by Amal Othman, chairwoman of the assembly's Legislative and Constitutional Affairs Committee. It will also include Ramzi El-Shaer, a veteran constitutional law professor and an appointed MP, and Mohamed Dakrori, an appointed MP and the legal adviser of President Hosni Mubarak. According to PA Speaker Fathi Sorour, the committee will collect and study the constitutional reforms proposed by MPs. "At the end of this week," said Sorour, "the committee will have to meet and start preparing a report on constitutional reforms proposed by parliamentarians." The report, Sorour said, will first be discussed by the PA in a special hearing. Later, a comprehensive report on the proposed reforms will be submitted to President Mubarak. On his return from Morocco early last month, Mubarak said that at the start of this month, both the PA and Shura Council will present him two reports about their proposals for new constitutional reforms. "In light of these proposals," said Mubarak, "I will ask parliament to discuss certain constitutional amendments in the same way Article 76 was amended last year," said Mubarak. In their proposals, MPs focussed on a list including 10 constitutional reforms. Again, disagreements emerged between the PA and Shura Council. According to Safwat El-Sherif, the National Democratic Party's secretary-general and chairman of the Shura Council, 90 per cent of Shura members asked that the upper house consultative council be reinforced with supervisory powers. "Shura members," said El-Sherif, "aim to have the right to direct questions and information requests to cabinet ministers." El-Sherif added, "they also want to enjoy the prerogative of proposing laws." He explained that Shura members had asked that the constitution states that the council's approval of laws be a must so that such laws do not face the spectre of being ruled unconstitutional. "Shura members want that the PA not remain authorised with the exclusive right of withdrawing confidence from a certain cabinet minister or the government as a whole," El-Sherif said. "The Shura Council should share with the People's Assembly this right." In the PA, however, there was semi- consensus that the Shura Council should be stripped of possessing any legislative or further supervisory powers. Despite belonging to various ideological backgrounds, MPs did not differ much in their proposed reforms. MPs belonging to Al-Wafd, the Muslim Brotherhood and leftist parties agreed that Egypt was in urgent need of a new constitution which would turn the country into a parliamentary democracy. Almost all MPs -- ruling National Democratic Party's deputies included -- seek to relinquish the current individual candidacy system in favour of the slate system. NDP MPs, apparently under instructions from their top officials, want parliament to have a certain quota of female MPs. They also reject the article stating that 50 per cent of parliamentary seats be reserved for representatives of workers, and that farmers be abandoned. El-Sherif also said that the NDP, apparently in agreement with the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, wants that Article 2, stating that Islamic Sharia (law) be the main source of legislation, be maintained.
