As the ruling National Democratic Party hosts its annual convention this weekend, the country's political forces appear to be maneuvering toward an endgame in advance of parliamentary elections scheduled for next fall and a presidential vote in 2011. “Everybody's gearing up,” said Walid Kazziha, a political science professor at the American University in Cairo. After a season of public speculation, observers will be watching the convention closely for both overt and subtle signs of the party's intentions going forward. President Hosni Mubarak remains firmly in command of the country after 28 years of ruling under defacto martial law. But the 81-year old Mubarak's advancing age and the steadily increasing public profile of his Gamal,46, have fueled a stream of rumors that a hereditary succession plan was being fast-tracked. Few expect the convention itself to make many headlines. NDP Secretary General Safwat El-Sherif has already stated that the subject of Mubarak's successor will not be on the agenda, telling reporters, “That's not our job.” But all eyes will nonetheless be on the younger Mubarak, whose political coming-out party started seven years ago at the 2002 NDP convention. Since then his power and profile have risen steadily. A specially created Policies Secretariat was invented—headed by Gamal Mubarak and stocked with his allies; it quickly became a party within the ruling party and several of its members have since ascended to cabinet positions. Topping the convention's agenda will be preparations for parliamentary elections, scheduled for November 2010. The government was embarrassed by a poor showing in the last round of elections in 2005. Candidates from the Muslim Brotherhood—running as nominal independents to avoid an official ban on the group—captured 20 percent of the People's Assembly. In dozens of other districts, the official NDP candidate lost to other party members running as independents after being passed over for nomination. In the aftermath, Gamal Mubarak was largely placed in charge of reforming the NDP's image, clearing away the dead wood and making the party more appealing to a younger generation. He has tried to fashion a more accessible and youth-friendly ruling party—hosting a pair of stage-managed online question and answer sessions in recent months and establishing an NDP presence on new social media outlets such as Facebook, Flickr and Youtube. Meanwhile, outside the corridors of power, Egypt's myriad opposition forces are also gathering their strength, with an eye on the parliamentary vote and beyond. Last week saw the formation of an umbrella group bringing together multiple opposition parties around a rallying cry of preventing Gamal Mubarak's ascension to power. But Kazziha, the political science professor, doesn't expect even a fully unified opposition will be able to make much of a difference in either the parliamentary elections or the presidential succession question. “We have no real political parties,” he said. We have been de-politicized.” The closest thing to a real opposition force, he said, is the banned Muslim Brotherhood—which will be hard-pressed to repeat its successes from the 2005 elections. Those victories clearly took the government by surprise, something that seems unlikely to happen again. “They achieved some successes in previous elections. But the situation is different now.” Interior Minister Habib el-Adly ominously told reporters earlier this month. The Brotherhood has been severely affected by a steady government crackdown. At least four of its 10 most senior leaders are behind bars, and the party faces a potential leadership struggle early next year when its Supreme Guide Mahdi Akef steps down. Amid that uncertainty comes an electoral showdown with a ruling party determined not to repeat the embarrassment of 2005. “This time they're not going to let the Brotherhood do it again,” Kazziha said. “They won't get a chance.” As for the presidential question, the latest Egyptian media obsession is coming up with alternative names to succeed Hosni Mubarak, other than his son. High-profile Egyptians such as Arab League Chief Amr Moussa, Nobel Prize winner Ahmed Zuweil and International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed el-Baradei have each been floated as potential candidates, and Moussa caused a week-long media uproar simply by refusing to categorically rule out the possibility in an interview. But the alternative candidates game ignores one crucial fact: recent changes to the Egyptian constitution make it nearly impossible for anyone outside the established Egyptian political order to run for president. The 2005 constitutional amendment that established multi-candidate presidential elections also set in place harsh restrictions for candidacy. Any candidate for president must be a high-ranking member of an established political party for a year prior to the vote. Non-party members must receive endorsements from dozens of members of the higher and lower houses of parliament and the local councils—all three of which are dominated by the NDP. “There are constraints that continue to render candidacy for president a monopoly for the same people, whether they are from the NDP or opposition parties” wrote columnist Mohammed Salah in the London-based Arabic daily Al-Hayat. “This makes the candidacy of independents nearly impossible.” Salah joked that, given the official constraints, Egyptians might as well rally behind football star Mohamed Abu Treika for president—provided that he performs well in a Nov. 14 World Cup qualifying match against Algeria.
