The People's Assembly featured fiery debates on alleged high-profile corruption in government circles, reports Gamal Essam El-Din The proliferation of corruption and abuse of power dominated the intense debates at the People's Assembly this week. The fireworks began on Sunday, when the assembly met to discuss a preliminary report about the sinking of the Egyptian ferry Al-Salam 98 in the Red Sea two weeks ago. The report, prepared by the assembly's transport committee, called it the most tragic disaster to hit Egypt in its modern history. Committee chairman Hamdi El-Tahan said "carelessness, indifference and corruption [were] the main culprits." Unimpressed by El-Tahan's report, Nasserist and Muslim Brotherhood MPs joined forces to point accusatory fingers at what they called "the corruption and cronyism of high-ranking officials in the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP)." They named Zakaria Azmi, the chief of President Hosni Mubarak's staff and the NDP's deputy assistant for organisation, administrative and financial affairs, as the top offender. Leading the attack against Azmi, Nasserist MPs linked him to Mamdouh Ismail, the owner of Al-Salam 98. They said Ismail was a close friend of Azmi's, and that the latter was behind Ismail's appointment as a Shura Council deputy and the chairman of the NDP's Heliopolis office. Saad Abboud, a Nasserist MP from the Karama (Dignity) Party, said Azmi's support had protected Ismail from investigations into his business activities and helped him make a fortune in a short period of time. Joining forces with Abboud was Talaat El-Sadat -- an independent MP and cousin of late President Anwar El-Sadat -- and Mostafa Bakri, a Nasserist MP and editor of the weekly pan- Arabist Al-Osbou. "Why should Ismail be appointed to the Shura Council?" asked Bakri. "The person who chose Ismail is the real criminal who supports and protects him of charges of corruption." Muslim Brotherhood MPs joined the fray, criticising the Shura Council for not lifting Ismail's immunity so that he could be investigated for the ferry disaster. The council said it had found the businessman's being allowed to testify before the prosecution-general as sufficient. Azmi responded to the attacks by saying he was grateful to Abboud for providing him with "the opportunity to answer his question about my friendship with Ismail. All I want to say is that yes, Ismail is a close friend of mine, but it is a matter of pure friendship, and by no means do I have a business relationship or partnership with him." The final say on whether Ismail is guilty or not should be left to the prosecution-general, Azmi said. The session also featured corruption accusations leveled at Transport Minister Mohamed Mansour by Kamal Ahmed, a Nasserist MP from Alexandria. But when Ahmed accused Mansour -- a prominent businessman who only joined the cabinet last month -- of being implicated in a substandard food imports scandal, he was checked by parliamentary speaker Fathi Sorour for mixing cards. Mansour dismissed any accusations of corruption, citing the "stellar reputation that has always been the hallmark of my life and businesses." The debates, which lasted late into the day, eventually turned towards the issue of interpellations. The constitution empowers MPs to direct these interpellations, or questions that must be answered by cabinet ministers and top officials, after the government's policy statement is delivered. Twenty-two interpellations have emerged in the wake of the statement delivered to the assembly by Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif on 30 January. They deal with thorny issues ranging from corruption in the agriculture, banking and media sectors, to the rigging of parliamentary elections, substandard food imports and the deteriorating conditions of three Egyptian detainees at the US's Guantanamo Bay prison. The interpellations mean Nazif and at least seven cabinet ministers could face Nasserist and Brotherhood MPs wrath. Bakri, for one, has submitted interpellations calling for former agriculture minister and NDP secretary- general Youssef Wali to be tried for allegedly dumping carcinogenic pesticides." The MP and editor has also posed a question on what he called "rampant financial and administrative corruption in national press organisations," accusing the former editors of four press organisations of using their positions to secure unwarranted fortunes. Bakri has also submitted an interpellation charging a lack of transparency in the sale of Bank of Alexandria's shares in Egyptian- American Bank. Topping the list of MP targets, however, is Interior Minister Habib El-Adli. Abboud and Brotherhood MPs Hussein Ibrahim and Hamdi Hassan said they hold El-Adli primarily responsible for what they called excessive human rights violations that marred last year's parliamentary elections. Abboud said, "security forces were deliberately instructed to do everything possible and impossible to intimidate people from voting so that NDP MPs would win the elections." Another Brotherhood MP, Akram El-Shaer, is accusing security forces of using excessive force to expel more than 3,000 Sudanese refugees from a public garden in Al-Mohandeseen. Mohamed Abdel-Alim, a Wafdist MP, is targeting Foreign Minister, Ahmed Abul-Gheit for not doing enough to seek the release of three Egyptians being detained in Guantanamo Bay. Abdel-Alim also blames the government for allowing some 15,000 Israelis to do business in Egypt. The Assembly, in coordination with the government, has decided that one interpellation should be discussed every month. Parliamentary and Legal Affairs Minister, Moufid Shehab said the government couldn't, however, discuss Bakri's interpellation about media corruption because the Shura Council is currently putting together a study on the same subject.
