It looks like Egyptian expatriates will have to wait until 2011 to vote for president. Magda El-Ghitany reports Egyptians living abroad expressed their disappointment this week upon learning that they will not be able to vote in the first ever multi-candidate presidential elections on 7 September. According to Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit, the administrative requirements necessary for such a vote were "quite complicated". He did leave open the possibility that Egyptian expatriates "may participate" in the 2011 presidential elections. Former Ambassador Essam Abdel-Rahman told Al-Ahram Weekly that it was a matter of both "legal and practical difficulties". Abdel-Rahman, a lawyer, said there were 250 Egyptian embassies and consulates around the world; each location would need judicial supervision, "which is not possible [since] the number of judges currently available barely covers the internal supervision process," he said. There was also very little time for the various logistical requirements, like prepping embassies to receive expatriates and facilitate the voting process, and producing accurate electoral lists. In fact, the Presidential Elections Commission -- the body in charge of supervising the entire election process -- said one of the main reasons Egyptians living abroad would not be voting was the lack of accurate lists demonstrating which expatriates actually have the right to vote. There are at least three million Egyptians who live abroad. Many are saying they deserve to be a part of what they are calling a "historic" event. "I do not see a particular reason why expatriates are being deprived of their right to vote in Egypt's first multi- candidate presidential elections," said prominent geologist Rushdie Said, who lives in the US. According to Said, it is the constitutional right of everyone with an Egyptian nationality to vote. "I am a full Egyptian. I would have definitely voted, if there was a chance." He said expatriates form a large community, which makes their participation in elections "vital"; by not allowing them to vote, the credibility of the elections as a whole is called into question. Adel Iskandar, president of the Egyptian- Canadian Friendship Association and editor- in-chief of the Canada-based Egyptian newspapers Al-Masri and Al-Mahrousa, said the obstacles that were supposedly in the way of expatriates' participating in the upcoming elections could have "easily been solved". According to Iskandar, determining which expatriates had dropped their Egyptian nationalities, for instance, was an "easy task", since only two countries -- Germany and Austria -- prohibit their nationals from carrying other passports. Putting together lists that include the names of Egyptians who are eligible to vote could have been done via documents that are already available at the Interior Ministry. Every effort should have been made, he said, to allow Egyptian expatriates to vote, since depriving them is a blunt "constitutional violation". Iskandar suggested that "trustworthy officials" like ambassadors could have supervised the elections instead of judges. Even Arab countries in the midst of wars and domestic chaos -- like Palestine and Iraq -- allowed their expatriates to have a say in their countries' latest elections, he said. UK-based Arabic literature professor Sabry Hafez said that all democratic nations -- despite differences in their respective political systems -- allow their expatriates to have a say in elections. He said the government should have facilitated all the necessary mechanisms to ensure expatriates' participation, which would have also helped foster their sense of belonging. "Despite the distance," he said, "it is their right to vote because, in the end, they are still Egyptians." France-based PhD student Khalid Ibrahim said it was par for the course for Egyptian expatriates to be marginalised when it comes to critical domestic issues. "I have been living in France for over 20 years now. Even though I have never lost interest in Egypt's domestic issues, I have also never felt myself received [by the Egyptian state] as a genuine Egyptian." Ibrahim said he often feels like he is even "more concerned with domestic issues than many of my friends who actually live in Egypt". And yet expatriates are never allowed to participate in vital domestic decisions, and are often perceived as "strangers"; their participation may occasionally be used as a "cosmetic factor to complete the democratic image", he said. "Sometimes I think we are perceived as disloyal just because we do not physically live in Egypt." Some expatriates, meanwhile, saw their sidelining as a natural consequence. Mohamed Mahmoud, an engineer who resides in the UK, said that the fact that he had decided to leave the country in the first place made it normal that he would "give up [his] right to contribute to the nation's political change." In any case, argued Abdel-Rahman, the lack of an expatriate vote would not "affect the legitimacy of the elections or violate the constitution," since their exclusion was for administrative rather than political reasons. He suggested that all interested parties should now work towards ensuring that expatriates take part in the 2011 elections, by abolishing any of the factors standing in the way this year.
