The NDP's sixth annual conference opens amid much talk of social justice and the usual speculation about whether President Mubarak will be succeeded by his son Gamal. So what's new, wonders Gamal Essam El-Din The sixth annual conference of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) opens on Saturday under the slogan "For You". NDP Secretary- General Safwat El-Sherif predicts between 2,500 and 2,700 delegates will gather on 30 October to attend discussions that will focus primarily on a wide range of social justice, political and economic issues. , chairman of the NDP's powerful Policies Committee, insists the sixth conference is of special significance for a number of reasons. Addressing a meeting of NDP Cairo office staff this week, he said that "2010 will witness two polls, the mid-term elections of the Shura Council and elections for the People's Assembly" arguing that it was incumbent on "the conference to come up not only with a vision for the two elections but one that encompasses the next five years". Mubarak said he was scheduled to address NDP delegates on Sunday, the second day of the conference, on the party's strategy for the 2010 Shura Council and parliamentary elections of 2010, and that his speech would include a review of the "NDP's policy paper on citizenship rights and democracy". "The paper will set out answers to critical political questions, including the fate of the emergency law, due to expire in May next year, decentralisation, and amendments to the laws regulating professional syndicates." The 2009 conference, he added, "will offer a review of four years' implementation of President Hosni Mubarak's 2005 presidential election programme. The programme has secured remarkable achievements in some sectors while it has so far fallen short in others." further argued that the NDP is in far better shape as it enters the 2010 elections than in 2005, when the Muslim Brotherhood was able to take 88 seats in the People's Assembly. The NDP, he said, "comes to the 2010 elections with a host of economic and political achievements on top of which is that the government has been able to weather the several global economic crises and still achieve a growth rate of 4.7 per cent." In a meeting with Al-Wadi Al-Gadid governorate students in the tourist city of Luxor on 23 October, Mubarak was keen to emphasis that the party was unwilling to condone any return to the policies of the 1960s. He urged students not to listen "to those who still defend the policies of the 1960s and spread disappointment among young people". "They aim to re-impose state control of the economy on the grounds that this guarantees a fairer distribution of income and will bridge the gap between rich and poor when all such claims have been repeatedly discredited." He added that part of his speech on the second day of the conference would "affirm that the NDP firmly believes in the role of the private sector and individual initiatives". In an open dialogue aired live on NDP's www.sharek.eg website on Monday, Mubarak was joined by Minister of Industry and Trade Rachid Mohamed Rachid. Again, private enterprise was emphasised. "The conference will discuss cutting public education down by 25-35 per cent with the private sector expanding to provide the shortfall," said Mubarak. Although leading members of the NDP are insistent that the conference will prioritise social justice and economic issues, they have faced a barrage of questions over the candidate for the 2011 presidential election. In his 23 October Luxor meeting, Mubarak ignored a question about the possibility of standing as a candidate. He did, however, say that anyone seeking to be president "should be capable of taking difficult decisions at the right time." "Late president Anwar El-Sadat is a very good example of this. He launched both the 1973 October War and 1977 peace initiative at the right time." NDP leaders have stressed that they will not allow the opposition to impose their agenda on the conference. Safwat El-Sherif told Rose El-Youssef newspaper on Tuesday that the conference will not only exclude any proposals for new constitutional amendments, there would be no change in the holders of leading positions and "subjects such as naming the NDP's candidate for the 2011 presidential elections will not be on the conference's agenda". Moufid Shehab, minister of state for legal and parliamentary affairs, pointed out that according to the constitution President Mubarak can nominate himself for another presidential term beginning in 2011. He belittled on suggestions that figures such as the Secretary-General of the Arab League Amr Moussa, Nobel Prize winner Ahmed Zuweil or director of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Mohamed El-Baradei might stand in the 2011 presidential elections. "To be a successful scientist or the head of an international organisation is not sufficient qualification to be president of Egypt," said Shehab. The opposition has been dismissive of what they say is no more than a PR exercise by the NDP. Muslim Brotherhood MPs describe the NDP conference slogan "For You" as meaningless. Essam El-Erian, a leading Muslim Brotherhood figure, said that the "NDP's slogans will remain hollow as long as Egyptians are denied a healthy political life". Osama El-Ghazali Harb, leader of the United Front Party, told the Weekly that "NDP conferences have been reduced to propaganda for ." "We cannot take the frequent statements of party leaders about social justice and economic issues seriously as long as these issues are raised to provide a smokescreen for the real objective of NDP conferences, which is to catapult into the presidency."
