Parliament and the war on terror

Deputies from the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, and possibly others, are expected to take the United States to task for its strikes against Afghanistan when the People's Assembly opens its new session next week. Gamal Essam El-Din reports
Following a five-month summer recess, the People's Assembly will open on 7 November for the second session of its five- year term. Fathi Sorour, 69, will most likely be re-elected as assembly speaker for the 12th consecutive year -- the longest such tenure in the nation's 143-year parliamentary history. Deputy Speakers Amal Osman and El-Sayed Rashed are also expected to be re-elected.
On 10 November, President Hosni Mubarak is expected to address an opening joint session of the People's Assembly and Shura Council.
The Assembly's procedural sitting will be especially significant this year. Acting on a 27 August ruling by the Supreme Administrative Court, the Assembly will strip independent MP and businessman Rami Lakah of his parliamentary membership on the grounds that he has dual nationality. Lakah, a 38-year-old Roman Catholic, has Egyptian and French passports.
Although Sorour's re-election appears to be a foregone conclusion, the winds of change are being felt at the Assembly. Pressure is mounting to replace the chairmen of some of its key committees. NDP sources confirmed that the chairmen of five committees (Economic Affairs, Health and Environmental Affairs, Local Administration, Complaints and Proposals, and Culture) will be changed.
The NDP's major problem this session, however, is to find a majority speaker. Last year the post was held by the chairman of the party's Housing Committee, Mohamed Mahmoud Ali Hassan. Hassan, a long-time construction engineer and chairman of the Union of Contractors, was upset by the NDP's refusal to nominate him for the post of chairman of the Syndicate of Engineers. Instead, the NDP nominated the minister of irrigation, Mahmoud Abu Zeid.
An irate Hassan defied the NDP's senior officials by declaring his intention to submit a bill to parliament aimed at deregulating the old landlord-tenant relationship law.
Government and NDP senior officials responded by emphasising that the bill reflected Hassan's personal point of view only -- not the NDP's. Kamal El-Shazli, minister of state for parliamentary affairs and NDP assistant secretary-general, announced this week that the government has not yet decided on its agenda of draft laws to be submitted to parliament in the new session.
Despite El-Shazli's announcement, several cabinet ministers recently unveiled lists of draft laws that will be submitted to the Assembly. Topping those lists are two bills: the first -- aimed at amending the Unified Tax Law -- envisions the cutting of taxes on personal income to spur demand on the local market and to revive the economy. The second is a long-awaited reform of the Unified Labour Law, designed to regulate relations between employers and workers in a market economy.
The opposition and independents also have their own draft laws -- primarily concerned with political reform -- although their chance at being passed by parliament are slim. They include a new electoral bill reintroducing a mixture of the individual candidacy and proportional representation slate systems. There are also bills aimed at barring citizens from holding dual nationality from running for election and banning the circulation, printing and even the entry into Egypt of newspapers published on the authority of foreign licenses.
In the meantime, three independent deputies have decided to establish a new partisan alliance in the Assembly. The trio -- Ayman Nour, Mohamed Farid Hassanein and Seif Mahmoud -- were expelled from the liberal Wafd party in March and July, and have recently joined the Arab Misr (Egypt) party. This party, led by Gamal Rabie, was established in 1977 to serve as the government party under the leadership of then Prime Minister Mamdouh Salem. The majority of its members, however, defected in 1978 to join the late President Anwar El- Sadat's National Democratic Party, which was established at the time. The ex-Wafd MPs clearly aim to make use of the Misr party to secure a larger niche for participation in parliamentary proceedings. The Assembly's internal regulations give representatives of such political parties a greater opportunity to express their views.
The trio's defection has not been without its consequences, however. Wahid El- Uqsuri, a member of the Misr party, has led what is, in effect, a rebellion against Rabie -- and proclaimed himself party leader. Some political observers speculated that the internal dispute might end up with the semi- governmental Political Parties Committee deciding to freeze the Misr Party. Six small parties -- from a total of 16 functioning parties -- have been frozen by the committee over the past two years.
For their part, the 17 members of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood are expected to cause an uproar by rallying against the US strikes against Afghanistan. Gamal Heshmat, a prominent Brotherhood figure, told Al-Ahram Weekly: "This is a war against the Islamic world and we should clearly express our opinion in parliament. We cannot remain silent in face of this anti-Islamic aggression."
Hamdi Hassan, another Brotherhood deputy, said that after the 11 September attacks against New York and Washington, the Brotherhood's MPs asked Sorour to summon an emergency sitting to voice protests against America's intentions to launch a war against Islamic countries. "It is regrettable that Sorour turned down these requests," Hassan said. According to some observers, anti-American sentiments will be voiced loud and clear in the Assembly's new session.
Heshmat has tabled a request for information to Prime Minister Atef Ebeid about the government's response to the economic consequences of the assault on America and America's war on terrorism. "The government's reaction was low-key, although some experts point out that the Egyptian economy's losses will be large in both the short and long runs," said Heshmat.
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