Dina Ezzat investigates who is most likely to be the next president This was supposed to be the year wherein toppled president Hosni Mubarak would run for a sixth term. Instead, 2011 is the year when Egypt will have its first real and democratic presidential elections, before or after transparent parliamentary elections. The race is already on. Former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency Mohamed El-Baradei, outgoing Arab League Secretary- General Amr Moussa, Ghad Party leader Ayman Nour, judge Hisham Bastawisi and retired diplomat Abdallah El-Ashaal have all said they would run for the next presidential elections. And others might yet join the race. Former prime minister Kamal El-Ganzouri and chairman of the Central Auditing Agency Gawdat Al-Malt are speculated as potential runners on behalf of the liberal Wafd Party. Egyptian-American scientist Ahmed Zuweil might also join should the prohibition imposed by draft constitutional amendments on bi- nationals be voted out in a referendum due Saturday, 19 March. So far, the main two candidates seem to be El-Baradei and Moussa. On the Facebook there is a growing race between sympathisers of the former, who seem to be making headway, and of the latter, who seem to be picking up. On Monday, the two men, both originally from the diplomatic corps, met in a private lunch at a Cairo restaurant. Details of the closed meeting were not disclosed by either. However, sources close to both men excluded speculation about an early electoral deal by which El-Baradei and Moussa would run on a joint ticket, with one running as president and the other as vice president. Once the window officially opens for nominees to apply, both El-Baradei and Moussa will be sending in their papers. Most observers agree that the final race is likely to be between both men. Either would be the first civilian president of Egypt. Since the July 1952 Revolution ended the monarchy, all presidents were from the military: Mohamed Naguib, Gamal Abdel-Nasser, Anwar El-Sadat and Hosni Mubarak. Today it seems almost certain that no military figure will run for the presidency, despite debate that some sources tell Al-Ahram Weekly is ongoing within some military quarters of having a retiree run. The general expectation is that the military will give its indirect support to the notion of civilian candidates. Nonetheless, the next president will ultimately be commander-in-chief of the army. Thus, it is unlikely that it would be someone the army would not approve of. So far, the army has been in touch with both El-Baradei and Moussa. The latter, who has never left the Egyptian diplomatic service and served as foreign minister for 10 years, has wider inroads within the military than El-Baradei who has been working overseas for three decades until he retired from the IAEA last year. This said; the decision of the military is not made yet, according to several sources. The same sources insist that whatever the preference is on the side of the military, it would not amount to direct interference, because ultimately whoever is sworn into office will have to accommodate the advice of the currently ruling Higher Council of the Armed Forces. On the ground, El-Baradei sympathisers are arguing the case of their candidate as a man who made a direct call for political reform and for regime change and who supported the 25 January Revolution in clear terms, even if he only made brief showings in Tahrir Square. For their part, Moussa sympathisers are talking about a man whose knowledge of the acute problems facing Egypt and the Egyptians is direct and uninterrupted by years of overseas residence. They argue that Moussa is someone who dared to criticise the situation in Egypt under Mubarak while in his post as Arab League secretary- general, rather than to wait for retirement to make a call for reform. Last Tuesday, Moussa undertook his first encounter, as would-be presidential candidate, with the public in Al-Sawy Culture Wheel, a cultural centre in the upscale Zamalek neighbourhood of Cairo. He said he would run for one term only. Moussa's critics argued that he is someone who served with Mubarak and that his political positions on the regime were not clear enough. On Wednesday, El-Baradei went on TV in interview with the Naguib Sawiris-owned ON TV. He said he would run for two terms. El-Baradei's critics said that he addresses Egyptian problems from an "Orientalist" and patronising point of view, and that he has not indicated a will to give up the Nile Collar granted to him by Mubarak. Meanwhile, there are some who are keen neither on El-Baradei nor Moussa. They argue that the debate should not be "El-Baradei or Moussa", but rather "what we want the next president to be like". After all, the 25 January Revolution aimed not only to change the president, but to overthrow a system whereby the people felt distant from, harassed under, and neglected by power. "I am sure that both Moussa and El-Baradei have something to offer, but I want to make a choice based on what they would offer, rather than on who they are," said Dalia, a Heliopolis resident. A banker with two children, Dalia added: "We removed the previous regime, but it is not very clear where we are going next, and I would vote for someone who has a clear vision for the future and who can convince me that he can execute this vision," she argued. According to political scientist Wahid Abdel-Meguid the "who" and the "why" of the next president in Egypt cannot be separated. Abdel-Meguid argues that the character, history and programme of the president are bound to overlap in the mind of the voter. "We are talking about candidates who will come out on TV and who will use the many resources of IT (Facebook and Twitter) to convey their message. So it is not just what they have to say, but also how they say it." Moreover, Abdel-Meguid added, in a society where the practice of democracy remains new, the character and the name of the president will remain important to the voter. The one most likely to be elected, suggested Abdel-Meguid, is the candidate who understands that "Egypt is and will be in a transitional phase for a long while" and that "he is president of a transitional phase" and he will stay in office "for one term only". The next president, in particular, needs to focus on establishing "a truly democratic system" and "the writing of a new constitution". The presidential campaigns of both El-Baradei and Moussa are set to launch. Human and financial capital is being recruited. Political coalitions are being drawn. Electoral tours are being sketched. Possible vice presidents are being considered. However, there is no clear sense of when the presidential campaigns will begin in earnest, as the Higher Council of the Armed Forces has yet to announce a date for the presidential elections themselves.
