CAIRO: The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) will call a meeting within a few days to make a final decision on whether the group will participate in the upcoming People's Assembly (PA) elections due to be held in November, MP Mohamed El-Beltagy told Daily News Egypt Tuesday. “The group's consultative council will call a meeting within a few days to [discuss the situation] and determine whether it will compete for parliamentary seats and the number of candidates we will field or, whether we will boycott the polls altogether,” El-Beltagy, also a senior MB member, said. The decision, according to El-Beltagy, will also be influenced by the stance of other opposition movements, groups and parties. When it won 88 seats in the last PA elections in 2005, the MB became the strongest bloc in the lower-house of the parliament after the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), which occupies 333 of 454 seats with its allies. This unprecedented victory raised the concern of both the regime and intellectuals who adopt a secular approach to politics and reject the group's slogan “Islam is the Solution.” Following the 2005 polls, Gamal Mubarak, President Hosni Mubarak's 47-year-old son and an NDP leader, said the group's emergence was having "negative repercussions on the electoral and political process." After the elections, the interior ministry intensified the security crackdown against the MB across Egypt, detaining about 4,000 group members and leaders; most of them have already been released, while some were imprisoned after facing trials at a military court. Currently dozens of MB members are behind bars; many of them were arrested during a reform campaign that involved other political and opposition groups and parties. The MB fielded 15 candidates but won no seats in the recent Shoura Council (Upper-House of the Parliament) elections held in June, whereas the NDP won 80 of 88 seats. The group recurrently said that violations were committed against them before and during elections by the NDP and the interior ministry. MB members run for elections as independents since the group is legally banned.
