The NDP will release the complete list of its candidates for the parliamentary elections tomorrow, reports Gamal Essam El-Din Twenty-four hours before the opening of the nomination process, the National Democratic Party (NDP) will reveal its list of candidates for November's parliamentary elections. As expected it will contest all 444 parliamentary seats. In vetting the names of candidates -- more than 2,700 were put forward -- the party's six-member steering committee disqualified those deemed not to have enough popular support, as well as nominees discovered not to have completed their military service. A large number of the disqualified applicants -- which include more than 100 members of the outgoing assembly -- have announced they will run as independents, raising the spectre of a repeat of the 2000 elections. Then official NDP candidates won just 170, or 38.8 per cent of seats in the assembly. Having failed to secure a majority the NDP rushed to admit 218 successful independents back to its ranks despite earlier threats to expel them, swelling the party's numbers in parliament to 388, or 85.5 per cent. While the campaign begins officially on 26 October, when the names of all the candidates contesting seats are finally declared, President Hosni Mubarak on Monday issued a decree calling on all registered voters to participate in the ballo. For only the second time in Egypt's 139- year-old parliamentary history, elections will be held in three stages, scheduled to run from 9 November to 7 December. In the first stage eight governorates will go to the polls while in the second and third nine governorates will vote. In the 2000 elections Cairo and Giza were in the final group of governorates to vote. This time the position has been reversed and both Cairo and Giza -- considered the main indicators of whether the vote is free or not -- come in the first round. In both governorates NDP candidates will face tough competition from prominent opposition figures, including Ayman Nour, standing in Bab Al-She'riya, and Munir Fakhri Abdel-Nour in Wayli. Closely fought battles will also occur outside the capital. In the Al-Qalioubiya Governorate district of Kafr Shukr, Investment Minister Mahmoud Mohieddin will be standing against his uncle Khaled Mohieddin, veteran leader of the left-wing Tagammu Party. In the Al-Beheira Governorate district of Damanhour Mustafa El-Feki, chairman of the outgoing Foreign Affairs Committee and a former aide to President Mubarak, will be standing against prominent Muslim Brotherhood member Gamal Heshmat, while in the Al-Menoufiya Governorate district of Al-Bagour Kamal El-Shazli faces a strong challenge from Mohamed Kamel, the Wafdist multi-millionaire. The first stage of the poll, scheduled from 9 to 15 November, includes the governorates of Cairo, Giza, Al-Menoufiya, Beni Sweif, Al-Minya, Assiut, Marsa Matrouh and the New Valley. The second, from 20 to 26 November, covers Alexandria, Al-Beheira, Ismailia, Port Said, Suez, Al-Qalioubiya, Fayoum, and Qena. The third, from 1 to 7 December, sees Al-Daqahliya, Al-Sharqiya, Kafr Al-Sheikh, Damietta, Sohag, Aswan, the Red Sea, North Sinai and South Sinai go to the polls. Voters will be able to cast their ballots at one of the 222 main polling stations and almost 10,000 auxiliary stations. For the first time responsibility for the elections will be divided between the Interior Ministry and the Higher Commission for Parliamentary Elections (HCPE). According to the law regulating the exercise of political rights, in addition to its chairman the HCPE will consist of three senior judges, six public figures, and a representative of the Interior Ministry. While the HCPE's responsibilities will be confined to arranging full judicial supervision, checking campaign costs and announcing the results, the Interior Ministry will supervise all other regulatory and administrative matters, including making voter lists available to candidates and providing security at polling stations. It is a division of responsibilities that has led opposition parties to voice concern about the government, NDP and control of the election process. In response they have joined ranks with other opposition movements, forming the National Front for Change (NFC). Noaman Gomaa, leader of the Wafd Party and the NFC's spokesman, said the HCPE is likely to repeat the mistakes made by the Presidential Elections Commission. How, he asked, can it be impartial when it is chaired by the Minister of Justice, a member of the ruling NDP. One test of the commission's integrity will be whether or not it makes voter lists available to opposition candidates, an issue on which Rifaat El-Said, Chairman of Tagammu, is far from hopeful. Hussein Abdel-Razeq, Secretary-General of the Tagammu Party, says NFC candidates will coordinate to ensure that they are not running in the same constituencies and do not split the opposition vote. Abdel-Razeq said he hopes that NFC's candidates will cover 90 per cent of all districts in Egypt. On Tuesday the Tagammu Party announced it was fielding 59 party members, running in 24 governorates. As for the remaining major parties, the Wafd, which has not yet released the names of its members contesting the elections, is expected to field some 160 candidates, the Nasserists are expected to field some 50 candidates, while the Ghad Party is expected to field 60 candidates. The Muslim Brothers -- coordinating with the NFC but running independently -- are expected to field some 160 members. The NDP list includes seven cabinet ministers, five of them -- Kamal El-Shazli (parliamentary affairs), Youssef Boutros- Ghali (finance), Mahmoud Abu Zeid (irrigation), Ibrahim Suleiman (housing), and Sayed Mashaal (military production) -- members of the outgoing assembly. The remaining two members of the current cabinet -- Mahmoud Mohieddin (investment), and Ahmed El-Leithi (agriculture), will be standing for the new assembly in Al-Qalioubiya and Al-Beheira. Contrary to earlier expectations, Minister of Local Administration Abdel-Reheim Shehata and Minister of Education Ahmed Gamaleddin Moussa will not be nominated by the NDP. Several prominent members of the party's old guard will also be contesting seats in the new assembly, including Fathi Sorour, parliamentary speaker since 1990; Zakaria Azmi, chief of presidential staff; Youssef Wali, a former minister of agriculture and Mustafa El-Feki. The NDP is also fielding a large number of businessmen, including Ahmed Ezz in Al-Menoufiya, Mohamed Abul-Enein in Giza, Khaled Abu Ismail in Alexandria, and Hossam Badrawi in Cairo. "Young faces" make up around 40 per cent of the NDP's 2005 list compared with 35 per cent in 2000.
