Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05CAIRO8112
2005-10-20 14:27:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Cairo
Cable title:  

EGYPT: PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS PREVIEW # 1

Tags:  PGOV KDEM EG 
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 CAIRO 008112 

SIPDIS

NSC STAFF FOR POUNDS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/20/2015
TAGS: PGOV KDEM EG
SUBJECT: EGYPT: PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS PREVIEW # 1

REF: CAIRO 7793

Classified by ECPO Minister Counselor Michael Corbin for
reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

-------
Summary
-------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 CAIRO 008112

SIPDIS

NSC STAFF FOR POUNDS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/20/2015
TAGS: PGOV KDEM EG
SUBJECT: EGYPT: PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS PREVIEW # 1

REF: CAIRO 7793

Classified by ECPO Minister Counselor Michael Corbin for
reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

--------------
Summary
--------------


1. (C) Four weeks before the first round of parliamentary
elections, we have achieved several modest successes and a
setback in the effort to help Egypt realize a more
transparent electoral process. Meanwhile, the ruling NDP has
released its slate of parliamentary candidates: The list
drops 35 percent of its incumbent MPs, including one cabinet
member, in favor of new candidates. The emerging consensus,
however, is that the NDP's slate is mainly "old wine in new
bottles." Reprising past practices, many NDP members who
failed to get the party nomination say they will run as
independents. The NDP is gambling that independents will not
do as well as they did in 2000 -- when only 38 percent of
official party nominees won. (Most were eventually absorbed
back into NDP ranks anyway.) Neither the ruling NDP nor the
opposition appears to have made the inclusion of women and
minorities a priority this year. Of 444 candidates the NDP
will field, only six are women and two are Coptic Christians.
Finally, the Parliamentary Elections Commission appears so
far to be exceeding the low standard set by the commission
which oversaw the presidential race. End summary.

--------------
Engagement for Transparency
--------------


2. (C) November 9 will see the first of three rounds of
Egypt's parliamentary elections (reftel). Our efforts to
press the GOE toward practices that will enhance the
transparency of the process have met with some significant
successes, and a setback, to date.

On the positive side we have:

-- Persuaded the GOE that police stations are not suitable
venues for polling places;

-- Secured collaboration between IFES and the GOE's State
Information Service, in a large-scale voter information
campaign aimed at minimizing the confusion which marked the
Sept. 7 presidential polls;

-- Convinced the GOE to take a more forward leaning and
affirmative position toward domestic election monitors;

-- Worked closely with NDI, whose new country director
arrived in Egypt last week, which is busy training domestic
monitors across Egypt;


and

-- Secured high level oral assurances that a substantial
international assessment team organized by NDI will be
allowed to operate in Egypt, and received by both NDP/GOE
officials and the opposition, for the duration of the
parliamentary elections process.

On the other hand:

-- While we succeded in putting the issue of transparent
(clear plastic) ballot boxes high on the GOE's agenda (and
saw it subsequently reported and debated in the Egyptian
media) - it appears that an affirmative decision will not
come in time for such boxes to be used this year.

--------------
Inside the NDP: A Murky Picture
--------------


3. (C) As Egypt approaches parliamentary elections on
November 9, the lion's share of public attention has been
focused on developments and maneuvers within the ruling
National Democratic Party (NDP). Following a relatively
low-key annual conference in late September, the party
announced in mid-October that it had settled on its slate of
candidates to compete for seats in the new People's Assembly.
The final list discarded 35 percent of the party's
incumbent MPs, including cabinet minister (for higher
education) Abdel Rahim Shehata. Two other cabinet members,
Education Minister Ahmed Gamal Eddin Moussa and Investment
Minister Mahmoud Mohieldin (a protege of Gamal Mubarak)
failed to secure the NDP's support for their bids to seek
parliamentary seats. (The official explanation for
Mohieldin's withdrawal from the race is that it was due to
pressure from his own family - he was to compete against his
uncle, the leftist Tagammu' Party leader Khalid Mohieldin.)


4. (C) Comment: We read Minister Shehata's failure to get his
party's nod to run again for his seat in parliament as a vote
of no confidence in him from the political leadership and
would bet against his survival in the next cabinet shuffle,
expected sometime after the parliamentary elections. Shehata
is rumored to have been implicated in a nascent corruption
scandal within his ministry. The significance of Education
Minister Ahmed Gamal Eddin's failure to get NDP support for a
run at a parliament seat is less clear cut - he is generally
viewed as a reform-minded technocrat in synch with the
message of the "new NDP." On the other hand, Gamal Mubarak
ally Hossam Badrawy has long sought a seat in the cabinet
and, as chairman of the People's Assembly's Education
Committee, would be a natural choice to succeed Gamal Eddin.
We doubt that Investment Minister Mohieldin's aborted
campaign will cause any damage to his career, given the high
marks he continues to receive, at home and abroad, for his
role in promoting structural economic reforms. End comment.


5. (C) Gamal Mubarak asserted to us earlier this fall that
the party's candidate selection would yield progressive,
electable candidates. Instead, the results of the party's
opaque selection process, referred to in NDP parlance as an
"electoral college" (apparently a combination of internal
straw-polling and back-room deals) seemed to demonstrate the
continuing influence of "old guard" machine politicians like
Kamal El-Shazly and Safwat El-Sherif, the party's Deputy
Secretary-General and Secretary-General, respectively. The

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bases for selection, the NDP officials insist to us, were
electability and adherence to the party's vision for a new,
modernist Egypt.

--------------
Old Wine, New Bottles?
--------------


6. (C) Despite the party's "New Thinking" fanfare, the
emerging consensus among those analyzing the NDP's new fall
line up is that the group is merely "old wine in new
bottles," in the words of a senior judicial contact. Even
the pro-government Al-Ahram Weekly declared the "Party's Old
Guard Prevails" in reporting the new slate. Observers have
been quick to point out that the party's veteran old guard
stalwarts Kamal El-Shazly, Zakaria Azmy, and even the
disgraced former Agriculture Minister Youssef Wally have all
gotten the nod as NDP parliamentary candidates.


7. (C) While the nominations of neither Shazly nor Azmy are
surprising, given their continuing proximity to Mubarak and
their long and deep history with him, Wally's nomination is
arguably more puzzling - in the context of continuing
controversy over scandals which occured on his watch,
including the importation of dangerous pesticides blamed for
the tainted watermelons which reportedly hospitalized scores
of Egyptians this summer. A number of commentators in the
Egyptian press have been quick to point out that many among
the NDP's new candidates are in fact veterans of old school
politics and were members of the 1995-2000 parliament.


8. (C) Comment: We believe the old guard - new guard
dichotomy in discussing intra-NDP dynamics is becoming less
relevant. Gamal Mubarak's grip on the ruling party appears
stronger than it ever has been. Old guard figures like
Shazly and Safwat, rather than suffering the humiliating
displacement some predicted, have retained their positions
and increasingly seemed "on message" and in step with Gamal
in their public actions and statements. To the extent that
they represented competing factions in the past (a subject of
vigorous debate among Egypt watchers),they have clearly put
aside their differences in the interest of expediency, at
least until the parliamentary elections are settled. End
comment.

--------------
Independents: The X Factor
--------------


9. (C) Almost all of the NDP incumbents displaced by this
year's process, and many others, have vowed to run for seats
as independents this year. Clearly, the NDP's nightmare
scenario is a repeat of the 2000 elections, in which NDP
nominees took only 38 percent of the seats they were
competing for. The ruling party only retained its crushing
majority in parliament after it wooed the victorious MPs back
into the tent after the elections. This year, senior NDP
official (and Mubarak's chief of staff) Zakaria Azmy, has
announced that "NDP renegades" - party members who run for
office against official nominees - will not be welcome to
return to the party, even if they prevail. We suspect this
position could become more malleable should the NDP's
nominees perform worse across the board than the party
leadership hopes.

--------------
Diversity 2005: A Non-Issue
--------------


10. (C) One troubling early indicator from the slates of
candidates that have been published so far is the dearth of
women candidates. The NDP, for example, has six women
candidates out of 444. The united opposition front does only
slightly better, so far, with seven women on a slate of 222.
The NDP has gone even lighter on its selection of candidates
from the Coptic Christian minority, which makes up 7-10
percent of the population. Bishop Morcos of Shubra
al-Khaima, an Embassy contact and senior member of the Coptic
Orthodox Church, was quoted in the Arabic media as warning
that the exclusion of Copts was a "bad way to reward the
church." (Comment: Morcos was presumably referring to Pope
Shenouda's controversial expressions of fealty to Mubarak in
the run up to the September 7 Presidential Election, which
some had speculated would be "rewarded" with unspecified
gestures to the Christian community later on. End comment.)


--------------
Parliamentary Elections Commission
--------------


11. (C) In contrast to the performance of the Presidential
Election Commission (PrEC)--widely criticized for its
imperious style and lack of accountability--the Parliamentary
Election Commission (PaEC) appears to be off to a better
start. The PaEC, which is chaired by Minister of Justice
Mahmoud Aboul Leil, has signaled that it will allow domestic
civil society monitors to observe both voting and vote
counting. By contrast, the PrEC refused to allow civil
society monitor access until mid-way through voting day, a
decision that led to confusion and additional loss of
credibility. In addition, the PaEC has publicized its
communications with manufacturers of transparent ballot
boxes, and also noted that it is exploring a local
procurement of boxes from Egyptian suppliers. However, as
noted above, all indications are that an affirmative decision
in time for the GOE to deploy the boxes this year seems more
and more unlikely.


RICCIARDONE