Throughout Egypt's modern history the selection of the head of state has been in accordance with strict rules, writes Abdel-Moneim Said To judge from the current media assault against Egypt some people give little thought to instruments of law. The large numbers of journalists and television programmes and radio stations involved represents the quantifiable side of the campaign. But it has another dimension: most of the journalists and commentators have a negative impression of the state of Egypt in general, and the state of its political affairs in particular. There is probably nothing new in this. A political season marked by parliamentary elections in November and presidential elections the following year offers great journalistic fodder, especially in a country such as Egypt that excites abundant rumours and anecdotes. I felt the attack coming during a recent visit to Washington. Most of the political and strategic research centres there were focussing on events in Egypt. After sifting through them, turning them this way and that, they inevitably homed in on the succession business, which continues to befuddle them. Now that El-Baradei's star has waned in these centres' eyes, their experts having found that he isn't sufficiently durable to be presidential material. They view him as an occasional passerby, one who grazed on the fringes of the left only to suddenly throw himself into the arms of the Muslim Brothers. Not that this is my own opinion of El-Baradei, who is a far more complex phenomenon than he appears in Cairo and Washington. What really took me by surprise was that both capitals seem insufficiently aware of two facts. The first is that the Egyptian state -- the system that governs the people and their land -- has existed for thousands of years. In its modern form it is more than a couple of centuries old. The second is that any change of the head of state, whether he bore the title of khedive, sultan, king or president, always proceeded in accordance with a written instrument. That instrument might have been an edict or a constitutional article, but no one would deviate an inch from its provisions. This applied when Egypt was under Ottoman suzerainty, an independent monarchy and after it became a presidential republic. Moreover, whenever there was an attempt to override the legal instrument it was the legitimacy of that instrument that won out even when its adversaries possessed overwhelming force. The modern history of such documents opens with the Ottoman Wali, or viceroy, of Egypt, Mohamed Ali the Great, and his bid to secede from the Ottoman Empire. It has its roots in the Treaty of London, signed between the Sublime Porte and Russia, Britain, Austria and Prussia on 15 July 1849. The first article of this document gives Mohamed Ali and his successors the right to hereditary rule over Egypt. It further stipulates that Mohamed Ali would be entitled to retain control over southern Syria (Palestine) but would have to evacuate Crete, the Hejaz and Adana. The second provision was an ultimatum. It stated that if Mohamed Ali did not accept the conditions within 10 days he would be divested of his rule over Acre, and that if he persisted in his rejection for another 10 days the Ottoman sultan would divest him of his governorship of Egypt. Mohamed Ali persisted. He believed that with the aid of the French he could break the European alliance against him. The latter ultimately refused to support him and he had to withdraw his forces from the Levant and content himself with being the founder of a dynasty in Egypt. On 13 February 1841, the Sublime Porte issued an edict granting Mohamed Ali and his male progeny rule over Egypt on the condition that the Ottoman sultan chose the successor. It also stipulated that in the event that the male family line died out, the Ottoman Porte would choose Egypt's ruler. The firman came with the additional caveat that the governorship of Egypt was a hereditary grant which was subject to the conditions of this firman and would be annulled should any of Mohamed Ali's successors breach the conditions. Through continued resistance and astute diplomacy, Mohamed Ali compelled the Sublime Porte to issue more firmans. The first, on 23 May 1841, and the second on 1 June, established the succession through Mohamed Ali's line and confined the sultan's powers in this regard to ratifying the succession by means of an edict of investiture. Modern Egypt's first instrument regulating the succession of the head-of-state was put to the test with the assassination of Abbas Pasha, the third ruler of the Mohamed Ali dynasty who had succeeded Mohamed Ali's son, Ibrahim. An attempt to bypass Said, the rightful successor under the above- mentioned firmans, was briskly quashed, enabling Said to come to power in 1854. In 1863 Ismail succeeded to the throne according to the Ottoman writ. As powerful and determined as this ruler was, and in spite of the fact that Egypt had become effectively autonomous from Istanbulas reflected in the title of Khedive that was bestowed upon him, he failed in his attempt to make hereditary succession through his line automatic, which is to say without having to receive the written seal of approval of the Sublime Porte. The legal instrument prevailed. It had to because it furnished the basis of legitimacy without which it is impossible to assume power in Egypt. Egypt won independence following the great revolution of 1919. In 1923 it issued a constitution, the first article of which stated that Egypt is a sovereign, free and independent state whose land is indivisible and unrelinquishable, and whose government is a hereditary monarchy with a parliamentary representational system. Article 32 provided for succession to the throne through the line of Mohamed Ali, in accordance with the Royal Decree of 13 April 1922. According to Article 52, following the death of a king, the two houses of parliament would assemble within ten days. If the Chamber of Deputies (the lower house) was dissolved at the time, and if the suspension period extended beyond the ten days following the announcement of the death, the old council would reconvene until a new chamber had been elected. Under Article 54, in the event that the throne being vacated due to the lack of an heir or of a successor-designate, the two houses would assemble immediately to select a king. They would have eight days to make a decision, though it would be considered valid only if three-fourths or more of both houses were present and it commanded a two-thirds majority. In the event no agreement emerged within eight days a joint session of parliament would be convened at which point the quorum and majority stipulations no longer applied and a new ruler could be chosen on the basis of a simple majority. Should the Chamber of Deputies have been dissolved at the time the throne was vacated it would reconvene until a new chamber could succeed it. Article 55 stated that between the death of a king and the swearing in of his successor or a regency council the constitutional powers of the king would be vested in the Council of Ministers which would perform them in the name of the Egyptian nation. These constitutional provisions -- modern Egypt's third legal instrument regulating the succession of the head-of-state -- were applied upon the death of King Fouad I on 28 April 1936. As his son, Farouk, was a minor at the time, a regency council was formed in accordance with Article 55 of the 1923 constitution. Headed by Prince Mohamed Ali, the son of the Khedive Tawfiq, who was the eldest prince of the Mohamed Ali family, the council performed its duties for a year and three months, at which point Farouk came of age and was crowned on 29 July 1939. Many Egyptians, and even more foreigners, believe that the 1952 revolution broke with the succession convention. In fact it was unlike most other revolutions in which the old texts are ripped to shreds and the new authorities rule by extraordinary powers after executing or dismantling the pillars of the old order. In Egypt King Farouk abdicated and, after bequeathing power to his son Ahmed Fouad, was given a formal send-off by the Egyptian navy, which issued a 21-gun salute. As the royal heir was only six months old at the time a regency council was formed, consisting of Prince Mohamed Abdel-Moneim, Bahieddin Barakat Pasha, and Colonel Rashad Muhanna. However, effective power resided in the post-revolutionary cabinet, which was headed by Ali Maher and, subsequently, by General Mohamed Naguib, who also served as general commander of the armed forces and chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council. It was not until 18 June 1953 that the monarchy was officially abolished, a republic declared and Naguib invested as the temporary president of the new republic until the promulgation of a new constitution. Not even a man of the stature and charisma of Gamal Abdel-Nasser, the true mastermind of the 1952 Revolution, could circumvent the written instruments of law, neither during the crisis of March 1954 nor after Naguib resigned from office on 14 November that year. The powers and duties of the presidency may have been handed to Nasser, but he could not call himself president. That post had to remain vacant for nine months until the promulgation of a new constitution in 1956. Only then could a referendum be held. Nasser was sworn in as president on 23 June 1956, in accordance with the provisions of the 1956 constitution. In like manner, when Egypt and Syria united in February 1958 to form the United Arab Republic, Nasser was elected president by referendum. He was re-elected as president of Egypt in March 1965, again in accordance with the constitutionally stipulated referendum process. Under Article 121 of the 1956 constitution the National Assembly nominates the president by an absolute majority and the nominee is then confirmed by a general referendum. The candidate becomes president on the basis of an absolute majority of the votes cast. Article 102 of the 1964 constitution contained a similar provision. A nominee needed to have the support of at least a third of the National Assembly's members and a two- thirds majority was required to confirm a nominee before his name could be put to a referendum. In the event that no nominee secured the required majority the nominations would be put to a vote within two days and the nominee who obtained a simple majority would become the candidate for the national referendum. If the candidate failed to obtain the required absolute majority of the popular vote, the National Assembly would have to nominate another candidate following the same rules and procedures. Following the death of Gamal Abdel-Nasser on 28 September 1970 power was handed automatically to his vice president, Mohamed Anwar El-Sadat. Sadat was then confirmed as president by a popular referendum held in October that year, and he was re-elected as president by referendum in October 1976. Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, author of Autumn of Fury, witnessed the transition first hand. When Sadat solicited his opinion he responded that the most important consideration was to ensure that the people had a sense of continuity. His advice was not to innovate or depart from the norm, but rather to adhere to rules already laid down. That rule existed and it was to be found in the constitution. It stated that in the event of the death of the president, the vice-president would step in for a period of sixty days, after which a referendum would be held on a successor to the deceased president. Heikal repeated the same advice to another group of people who wanted to suppress the legal instrument, ostensibly in order to safeguard the Nasserist legacy. More interestingly, some quarters at the time wondered whether Egypt should resort to the rules and procedures for succession that prevailed at the death of King Fouad. To me this reflects a deep awareness of the continuity of the Egyptian state. In 1971 a new instrument of legitimacy emerged in the shape of a new constitution. Article 76 of this document provides for the nomination of the presidential candidate by the People's Assembly and by popular referendum. Again, any nominee required a two-thirds majority of the house to become a candidate in the referendum, and required an absolute majority of the popular vote to be confirmed as president. If either these conditions was not met the nomination process would have to begin again. The text was applied, to the letter, following the assassination of Sadat on 6 October 1981. Speaker of the People's Assembly Sufi Abu Taleb served as president temporarily until Hosni Mubarak was officially sworn into office and assumed the constitutional powers of the presidency on 14 October 1981. Mubarak had obtained the required majority of the People's Assembly and of the popular vote, in accordance with the provisions of the constitution as amended under Sadat in 1980. Mubarak was re-elected in accordance with the same provisions in 1987, 1993 and 1999. Mubarak was elected to a fifth term in the autumn of 2005, after the amendment of constitutional Article 76 earlier that year. That amendment abolished the referendum method and introduced direct multi-candidate elections for the first time in Egyptian history. Competing with Mubarak, the NDP presidential candidate, were representatives from nine other parties: the Wafd, Ghad (Tomorrow), the Social Solidarity Party, the Egyptian Arab Socialist Party, the Democratic Unionist Party, the Constitutional Party, Al-Umma (the Nation), Egypt 2000 and the National Conciliation Party. Mubarak won 88.6 per cent of the votes cast. The history of the transfer of power in modern Egypt tells us that while the instrument could be altered in accordance with the rules of the system that created it, it was inviolable. Whatever reservations one might have on such constitutional instruments -- and there may be legitimate reservations -- the way to deal with them is through public discussion and debate and by attempting to persuade a majority of our representational bodies of the need to change them. This is hard to understand for groups that think change can be brought about by a snap of the fingers. But they should at least appreciate that the continuity and the uniqueness of the Egyptian state lies in its ability to adhere to established legal codes in times of transition. Only when the transition has been weathered is it possible to deliberate coolly and rationally over whether these instruments need to be changed, and how.
