Opposition parties – bent on expressing their outrage at former chief of atomic energy watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei's reform demands – vowed Wednesday to bring him to account for what they called the “mistakes” he committed when he was the world's top nuclear weapons inspector. Officials inside these parties would organise a public mock trial of ElBaradei soon to hear several charges against him, including what they describe as his “role in facilitating the occupation of Iraq”. “ElBaradei was at the helm of the atomic energy agency when the US claimed that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction,” said Ahmed Gibeely, the chief of the People's Democratic Party. “But he didn't do anything to stop the invasion,” he told The Egyptian Gazette in an interview over the phone. Gibeely and his colleagues say they are not against ElBaradei's bid to run for president, but they have objections to allowing him to pass without “bringing him to account for his collaboration with the US in the destruction of Iraq”. They call Saddem Hussein a “hero” and make similarities between ELBaradei and Hamid Karazi, the Afghan President who was assisted to the presidency by the US. But this might not be the view held by a large number of Egyptians, some of whom gave a hero's welcome to Elbaradei at the Cairo Airport on February 19. For these people, Elbaradei is a new ray of hope that can break the monopoly the ruling National Democratic Party has been imposing on everything in this country for 30 years now, experts say. They add that the fight now is over whether this country will enjoy a real democracy where a transition of power happens peacefully, or suffer political stagnation forever. Elbaradei on Tuesday declared a new plan for action in the days to come to make this transition possible. He called for the collaboration of all Egyptians in putting pressure on the Egyptian regime so that it amends the constitution and allow foreign supervision over the elections. “We're not against ELBaradei's reform demands,” said Sami Hegazi, the chief of the Umah Party. “We're only against his record at the atomic energy agency,” he added. The comic thing, though, is that while fellow Egyptians like these party leaders prepare to distract ElBaradei from his reform plan, the man is celebrated on the international scene, some people say. When he left Egypt a few days ago, ElBaradei headed for Germany where he received an award from the German President for his conduct at steering the helm of the atomic energy agency. But here in Egypt, anger seems to be rising the minor political parties that want to bring the man to the trial. One reason why they might be angry with him, some commentators say, is that he has totally disregarded them in his reform plan. ElBaradei has even expressed contempt for Egypt's political party system by refusing to join any of the current political parties to be able to run for presidency in 2011. “He doesn't respect Egypt's political parties,” Gibeely said. “By disrespecting the parties, ElBaradei holds Egypt's democracy in scorn,” he added. Gibeely himself says he suffers problems with issuing the newspaper of his party and suffers financial constraints because of what he liked to term as “the siege by the Government”. When he and his colleagues organised a conference on Sunday to denounce ElBaradei, more than 70 per cent of those who showed up came to ElBaradei defence, according to witnesses. Some people in this audience even scoffed at their criticism of ElBaradei, the witnesses added. Even with this, these party leaders say ElBaradei is not either God-sent or above criticism. “He had never referred to Israel's nuclear arsenal,” Gibeely said. “By doing this, he helped Israel become even stronger,” he added.
