Egypt Presidential Vote May Not Be Very Open

Lawmakers voted Tuesday to change the constitution to allow Egypt’s first competitive presidential election, but they imposed complex rules that critics say will keep power squarely in the hands of President Hosni Mubarak and his ruling party.

The restrictions disappointed pro-democracy advocates who had hoped lawmakers would make good on Mubarak’s promise to hold a free and fair vote this fall.

Under the constitutional amendment, independents will be in effect banned from seeking the presidency. Government-sanctioned opposition parties will also face complex obstacles to nominating a candidate.

Egyptian voters will be asked to approve the constitutional change in a referendum expected to be held before the end of the month.

Although Mubarak will be forced for the first time to run for office if he wants to keep his job, the election guidelines leave ample room for Mubarak and his party to determine which candidates will run in future elections.

“It means there is no change in the system,” said Mohammed Sayed Said, an analyst at the Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, a think tank. “Most people say, ‘Why bother? Why did the president propose the amendment?’ He gave with the right hand, and they took away with the left hand.”

Members of the ruling party described Tuesday’s vote as a historic step toward democracy. “I think there’s no going back on reform,” said Mohammed Kamal, a member of the ruling party’s policy secretariat. “I see this as just the beginning.”

In Washington, the Bush administration gave a cautious response to the new law. President Bush has mentioned the Egyptian election as an important part of his plan to spread democracy in the Middle East.

“As a general matter of principle, we welcome anything that would enhance or expand participation” by voters, said State Department spokesman Tom Casey, who told reporters at a regularly scheduled briefing Tuesday that he had not had a chance to review the legislation.

A senior Bush administration official, elaborating later on Casey’s comments, called the law “not perfect, but a step in the right direction.”

“This exceeds what we thought would happen,” said the official, who declined to be identified by name because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

But the official acknowledged that the hurdles for independents to qualify were so high that “the prospects for a truly contested election are pretty slim.”

In a surprise February announcement, Mubarak pledged to change the constitution to pave the way for open elections and democracy. His promise came days after U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice canceled a visit to Cairo, reportedly to protest the imprisonment of opposition leader Ayman Nour.

Egyptians were left guessing who would be allowed to run, who would supervise the election and whether opposition candidates would have equal access to the country’s vast, state-run media.

Since the fall of the Egyptian monarchy in 1952, a lone presidential candidate has been handpicked by the Egyptian parliament. Egyptians were allowed to vote “yes” or “no” in a single-candidate referendum.

Skeptics had warned that the election could be designed as an empty exercise that would ease international pressure to reform but leave power in the hands of Mubarak and the ruling party. Egypt has been led by Mubarak since the assassination of President Anwar Sadat in 1981. The 77-year-old Mubarak has not yet announced whether he’ll seek another term this fall.

Even before Tuesday’s vote was held, emotional protests had boiled over in Cairo. An antiMubarak coalition that calls itself Enough had scheduled a news conference on the steps of a downtown political hall. But when its members arrived, they found the neighborhood choked off by riot police -- and pro-Mubarak demonstrators staging a rally on the steps.

The Enough activists moved inside, where they excoriated Mubarak, called upon Egyptians to boycott the referendum and pledged a campaign of civil disobedience.

“We’re not going to recognize the legitimacy of the amendment. We’re cutting another road,” said Abdel Halim Qandeel, a newspaper editor and founder of the Enough movement. “We will try to mobilize the people to participate in civil disobedience to end the regime’s rule.... We want to preempt a bloody social explosion.”

Outside, a rowdy crowd of Mubarak supporters waved pictures of the president and chanted: “We will give our blood and our souls for you, Mubarak” and “Mubarak, Mubarak, Egypt won’t forget your achievements.”

Asked why he had come, a teenager hesitated, then said he didn’t know. An older man at his side nudged him and said, “Say you are here because you support Mohammed Hosni Mubarak.” The boy dutifully echoed the phrase.

Meanwhile, a raucous debate erupted inside parliament between the ruling party deputies who dominate the house and opposition lawmakers over the amendment. The new guidelines were supported by 405 of Egypt’s 454 members of parliament.

“This is a constitutional massacre,” independent lawmaker Abdel Azim Maghrabi said in parliament, Associated Press reported. “Enough, enough, enough!”

“We still need Mubarak and we still need Mubarak’s purity,” replied Kamal Shazli, a staunch member of the ruling party.

By heaping insurmountable handicaps on independent candidates, Tuesday’s amendment continues the tradition of obstructing the Muslim Brotherhood. The banned Islamist group has managed to win seats in parliament and form the biggest, albeit unrecognized, opposition bloc by running its members as nominal independents.

“There wasn’t any real change. It’s just cosmetic,” said Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh, a Muslim Brotherhood spokesman. “We’ll continue to pressure the regime and push for real reforms, not the carnival we have now.”

The Muslim Brotherhood has been facing one of the harshest crackdowns of recent years this week. Hundreds of Brotherhood supporters are being held after days of arrests, Fotouh said Tuesday. Although the party is believed to be the most popular force in Egypt, the regime has relentlessly refused to grant the Muslim Brotherhood the right to form a political party.

“The Muslim Brotherhood want to establish a religious party, a party that believes in the creation of an Islamic state based on their interpretation of the Sharia [Islamic law],” said Kamal, the ruling party official. “I say this undermines democracy. It’s going to change the political discourse in Egypt and turn it into religious discourse.”

Under the amendment, independent presidential candidates will be banned from running unless they can collect 250 signatures of politicians in a complicated formula that requires the backing of members of both houses of parliament and the local councils of at least 14 of Egypt’s 26 provinces. But those bodies are so heavily dominated by the ruling party that only a candidate handpicked by the regime would be able to collect the needed signatures.

Independents have no place running for president, parliament speaker Fathi Sorour told reporters after the amendment was approved.

“Those who want to reach the position of president must have enough popularity.... If you have a party it means you have people around you, it means you’re legitimate,” Sorour said in a news conference carried live on state television. “Somebody who’s independent doesn’t have much political presence.”

But the regime rarely grants licenses to independent political parties. Since 1977, a government committee has granted licenses to four parties, rejecting 63 applications in the same period. Eleven of the existing 19 political parties had to seek court injunctions to get their licenses.

Members of the ruling party argue that the amendment will give Egypt’s political parties time to grow stronger. The nominating restrictions against parties have been waived for this year’s election. That means the parties, including beleaguered lawmaker Nour’s Tomorrow Party, will be able to nominate candidates for this fall’s election.

Critics say this year’s polling presents a safe, one-time opportunity for the regime to create the appearance of competition. The political parties have been so desiccated under Mubarak, they say, that they will be unable to produce strong foes to face him.

The outspoken Nour stands out as Mubarak’s most visible opponent, but he is facing forgery charges that could land him back in jail before the election.

In future elections, political parties will be severely restricted. No party will be eligible to nominate a candidate unless it controls 5% of the seats in parliament, about 23 seats. A party must also remain active for five consecutive years before the election.

But none of the opposition parties command that number of seats. Only three parties besides the ruling faction have managed to send a single representative to parliament, and the largest opposition bloc is made up of just seven lawmakers.

The requirement that parties remain active for five years before an election could also be prohibitive. Besides barring newer parties, it shuts out parties that have been temporarily suspended by the regime -- a relatively regular event in Egyptian politics. Seven of the 19 parties are currently suspended.

In the end, the amendment was “a balance between bureaucrats and democrats,” said Abdel Moneim Said, head of the Al Ahram Center for Strategic Studies. “Those who want to limit the horizons of choice and those who want to expand.”

Times staff writer Tyler Marshall in Washington contributed to this report.