The presidential election campaign is finally taking shape, reports Omayma Abdel-Latif Few surprises are expected in today's announcement of the final list of candidates for 7 September presidential elections. Preliminary reports suggest the Presidential Elections Committee will endorse 10 candidates, including the incumbent, President Hosni Mubarak, the ruling National Democratic Party's (NDP) nominee. Al-Wafd leader, Noaman Gomaa, and Ayman Nour, head of the Ghad Party, will be his two main rivals, though neither is expected to pose a serious challenge to Mubarak. The official line from the NDP, however, is that it is taking the race seriously and considers every candidate to be a challenge. A week before the official launch of the election campaign, the propaganda machines of the three candidates have been frantic in their attempts to secure media coverage. However, the various campaign teams have so far dealt in slogans rather than the nitty-gritty of actual policies. Indeed, it has appeared at times as if campaigners, particularly from the NDP and Wafd, have been seeking to shroud their candidates' manifestos in an aura of mystery, throwing a veil of secrecy over plans of action and platforms. Some details did emerge, on Wednesday, of the NDP's plan of action in the daily Al-Masri Al-Youm newspaper. Code-named Operation Future Crescent, the plan's ambitious goal is to ensure that 50 per cent of eligible voters cast their vote for the incumbent. In order to reach this goal the party will spread the word "in every village and district about the president's platform" and will provide "means of transport" for voters. It will set up operation rooms nationwide to keep track of the campaign. The NDP has already deployed an army of journalists to help run its campaign under the gaze of party officials housed in a state of the art headquarters in Heliopolis. But none of these efforts, aimed at promoting the elections as a step in a long process championed by Mubarak towards democratic opening, has been directed at elucidating just how the NDP's political and social reforms will actually be enacted -- so far at least. Commentators, inclined to adopt a more critical perspective, argue that the flurry of media-oriented activities have till now amounted to little more than an attempt to deflect attention away from the slow pace of reform in Egypt. Opposition parties, including both the leftist Tagammu and the Nasserist parties, insist the NDP remains focussed not on any radical overhaul of power structures but on altering its wrappings. And in a statement issued on Tuesday the Tagammu said it would persist in its boycott of the presidential elections and only engage in the campaign by mobilising support against the incumbent. NDP officials refute any suggestion that their commitment to the democratic process is less than genuine. "This is not about putting on a show of democracy," stressed Mohamed Kamal, a key member of Mubarak's campaign team and of the NDP's Policies Committee. "This is serious work which aims to allow Egyptians to choose the person they deem most capable of leading the country. We believe our candidate is the best choice." Despite such assurances some pundits fear that in the end the elections will do little more than replicate events in Tunisia where long-time President Zein Al-Abidine Bin Ali -- in an attempt to lend his rule legitimacy -- ran against a number of lame duck candidates approved by the regime. Gomaa's nomination, in view of some analysts, has guaranteed that such a scenario will not be repeated. "Gomaa's nomination," wrote Abdel-Moneim Said, director of Al-Ahram Centre for Strategic Studies, "has restored credibility to the process of electing the president of the republic by taking us away from the Tunisian model and widening the number of political, social and economic options from which voters can choose." Mubarak's platform, as outlined in his 28 July speech, highlighted political and constitutional reform, though only in outline. The details, say NDP sources, will emerge during speeches throughout the campaign, together with a timetable for the implementation of the promised constitutional amendments and subsequent legislation. Mubarak's campaign will also emphasise the economy, with promises of greater job opportunities and improved living standards. But again, details as to how this is to be achieved are in short supply, with party officials reluctant to make policy statements. According to Mahmoud Abaza, deputy head of the Wafd and Gomaa's spokesman, the focus of the Wafd Party platform will be civil liberties and not economics. "Securing civil liberties is a prerequisite for achieving economic growths," Abaza told Al-Ahram Weekly on Tuesday . Abaza dismissed press reports suggesting Gomaa's nomination was part of a deal struck with the NDP under which the Wafd will receive, in return, a number of seats in the forthcoming parliamentary elections. "In the last elections the NDP could secure no more than 38 per cent of the seats for itself. How then," he asked, "can a party that cannot re-elect its own members assist another party?" Both Gomaa and Nour have accused the NDP of contravening electoral rules by using state apparatuses to support their own candidate. Opposition papers reported two incidents this week which, they claim, undermine NDP promises that all state resources will remain neutral. Al-Arabi newspaper, mouthpiece of the Nasserist Party, reported on Sunday that the Interior Ministry had rounded up a number of Gomaa's supporters and threatened some with imprisonment. The ministry denied the incident had taken place. On Monday Al-Wafd newspaper reported on what it described as "the government's persistence" in interfering in the presidential elections, quoting Qalyubia Governor Adli Hussein as saying "Mubarak's electoral platform is the best" while accusing other candidates of lacking "any grassroots support". While Abaza points out his party is not surprised by such interference it remains against the rules supposedly governing the elections. "The state is becoming party in a battle towards which it claims to be neutral," he said.
