The Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF), the union representing labourers across the country, said it will withdraw from the 50-member Constituent Assembly after the committee refused to uphold a quota guaranteeing parliamentary seats for workers and farmers. The ETUF, which has 6 million members and claims to represent 25 million Egyptians, issued a statement on Monday night announcing its departure from the committee for voting to dissolve an amendment in place since the 1960s that guaranteed half of the seats in parliamentary assemblies for workers and farmers. "The committee session demonstrated a lack of interest in workers' rights by failing to put an explicit provision in the constitution for the rights of workers in the informal sector," read a statement from ETUF chairman Abdel Fattah Ibrahim. "A constitution that neglects the workers and farmers deserves a ‘no' vote in the referendum. We will stand together and vote ‘no.'" Moustafa Rostom, spokesman for the ETUF, said that quotas help protect democracy by representing those who would otherwise go unheard. "Workers need [a quota] because they don't have enough money to campaign for elections," said Rostom. "These things require a lot of money they don't have. They will be represented. That's why it's not against democracy." Diaa Rashwan, the Journalists Syndicate representative in the Constitutional Assembly, alternatively proposed replacing the workers' parliamentary quota with a quota for the poor. According to Rashwan's plan, a proportion of parliament seats would go to the proportion of the population who earn less than EGP 12,000 per year, as determined by tax records. Only people who earn less than EGP 24,000 per year would be eligible to run for these seats. Both women's rights groups and youth activists have been demanding quotas in parliament as well. Activist Dalia Al-Asad of the Al-Dostour party said that the consensus amongst women's rights groups is that women should be guaranteed 30% of the seats in parliament for the first 10 years of the new constitution. According to Constituent Assembly spokesman Mohamed Salmawy, the assembly is expected to be done with the drafting process on 3 December. Salmawy had announced the assembly was already done with drafting over 75% of the constitution.
