Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has called on the High Elections Commission to adhere to a court order allowing the group to use their slogan "Islam is the solution" in their campaign program for the forthcoming parliamentary elections. The group also called on the committee to end its blatant support of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) and to play its role with fairness and transparency. In its weekly post The Brotherhood's opinion published on its website on Thursday, the Brotherhood said the ruling regime had revealed its plans to rig the parliamentary elections a long time ago through its campaign of arrests of Brotherhood members. In the post, they also called on the Ministry of Interior to treat all candidates fairly and to step back from direct involvement in the electoral process. The Brotherhood also said that the arrest of some 250 of its members would not keep it from participating in the elections. They also criticized the NDP and called on it to stop exploiting state institutions. A spokesman for the Brotherhood, Saad al-Katatni told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the High Elections Commission “must take a neutral stance as it is not an affiliate of the NDP." In 2008, Egypt's parliament approved a legislation prohibiting the use of religious slogans in elections, in a move seen by experts as specifically targeting the MB, which frequently uses "Islam is the solution" as a campaign slogan. According to experts, the Egyptian government will likely resort to harassing MB candidates in an effort to erode the gains achieved by the group in 2005 parliamentary elections, when the MB managed to capture roughly 20 percent of the seats in the assembly. Many experts also believe that the weak performance of Brotherhood MPs over the last five years would adversely affect the group in the 28 November elections. In 2008, an Egyptian administrative court threw out a request to bar eight MB candidates from running in elections for seats in the Shura Council, the consultative house of Egypt's parliament, on the grounds that they used religious slogans in their campaigns.
