When it's a boycott, of course. Gamal Essam El-Din examines a week in which what began as a political crisis descended into farce A meeting between Lieutenant General Sami Anan, chief of military staff and deputy chair of the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), and the leaders of a number of political parties on 1 October, might have ended in agreement between the participants but has left the wider political scene in disarray. Even party leaders who attended said that more meetings were necessary to press for further concessions, though they expressed their satisfaction with the progress made so far. Among the outstanding issues are ending emergency laws and passing legislation that will prevent NDP stalwarts from re-entering parliament. On 2 October leaders of the Democratic Alliance, which includes the Wafd and the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party, met to review their agreement with SCAF and, hopefully, to settle ongoing disagreements about the allocation of parliamentary seats within the coalition. Alliance leaders noted that while their agreement with the SCAF "was a very progressive step towards moving the country to a civilian rule" if fell short of securing "the major demand of immediately lifting the 30-year-old state of emergency". The following day, during a visit to Minya to inaugurate a new highway, SCAF head Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi waded into the debate. The state of emergency, said Egypt's de facto ruler, would be lifted only when stability is restored. "No one wants the state of emergency to be extended indefinitely," said Tantawi. "But the shaky security conditions which Egypt is facing have forced us to reactivate the emergency laws." There are, of course, no guarantees as to when security will be restored. Many now fear the state of emergency will remain in force not just during parliamentary elections but well beyond the poll. "The revolution can never be complete as long as the state of emergency is in place," says Ayman Nour, leader of the Ghad Party and a member of the Democratic Alliance. Several constitutional experts, including former deputy chairman of the State Council Tarek El-Bishri, have pointed out that under the terms of the SCAF's own constitutional declaration of 30 March the state of emergency technically expired on 30 September. The military council's own legal experts, in a piece of legal backtracking that seems to question the legitimacy of its own declarations, insist that the two-year extension of emergency rule passed by the People's Assembly in May 2010 remains in force. Preventing former NDP officials from standing in the forthcoming elections seems a less fraught issue than the emergency law. The 1 October meeting with Anan, says Freedom and Justice chairman Mohamed Mursi, agreed that "NDP stalwarts -- including the 12 members of the NDP's politburo, 32 members of the secretariat-general, 250 members of the Policies Committee led by Mubarak's son Gamal, the chairmen of 27 provincial offices and districts, and MPs who gained their seats in the parliamentary elections of 2010, would all be prevented from standing". On 4 October Minister of Justice Mohamed Abdel-Aziz El-Guindi confirmed that an SCAF decree would soon be passed enforcing the ban. But stripping members of the now defunct NDP of their political rights is likely to face legal challenges. The constitution, argues Mamdouh Ali Hassan, construction magnate, former NDP stalwart and now head of the Horreya party, protects everyone from exercising their political rights in the absence of a judicial order ruling otherwise. While the full extent of the fallout from the 1 October meeting remains unclear, a timetable has at last been set for parliamentary elections. The People's Assembly poll will begin on 28 November and end on 10 January. Shura Council elections start on 29 January and end on 24 March. Both will be held in three stages. The two houses are scheduled to hold an inaugural joint session on 28 March. And by agreeing, in principle, on a nonbinding code of ethics containing guidelines for the new constitution the meeting has ended months of bitter disputes between Islamists and liberals. The latter had demanded the drafting of inviolable constitutional principles ahead of the elections. "The code of ethics," insists Saad El-Katatni, deputy chairman of the Freedom and Justice Party, "puts an end to any talk about inviolable constitutional principles." The meeting also agreed that the date of presidential elections will be fixed a day after any new constitution is approved by public referendum. Since the drafting of the constitution has a six- month time limit, this means that presidential elections could be held in November or December 2012. Anan also backtracked on the SCAF's earlier objection to international election monitors. They would now be welcome, he said. Representatives of the youth movements that kick-started the revolution have criticised the deal as a pact concluded behind closed doors and in pursuit of partisan, not national, interests. That accusation that tactical gains on a party level weighed heavy seems to be borne out by ongoing wrangling within the Democratic Coalition over seats. Until Al-Ahram Weekly went to press meetings were continuing between coalition members to try and reach a compromise. That the meeting has made a boycott of parliamentary elections less likely has been welcomed by commentators. In a remarkably impolitic statement deputy chairman of the Freedom and Justice Party Essam El-Erian said "the threat of an election boycott was a tactical move, aimed at pressuring the military council... it was never intended seriously." Which begs at least one obvious question: What can be taken seriously from the current crop of politicians? Many analysts have questioned whether the meeting will have any impact at all on the growing mistrust between the SCAF and the non-party movements that spearheaded the revolution. Youth movements like 6 April and the National Association for Change sharply criticised the fact that their representatives were excluded. Tahani El-Gibali, deputy head of Egypt's Constitutional Court, is less pessimistic. "The meeting," she says, "will help dissipate tension between military leaders and political activists and encourage a faster transition towards democracy."
