Background:
Prominent Egyptian democratization activist Dr. Sa‘d al-Dīn ʾĪbrāhīm (born 3 December, 1938) discusses the issue of elections in Egypt, and the extent to which they are fair or corrupt. Dr. ʾĪbrāhīm's interest is with democracy and human rights. He is involved in many organisations including his own Ibn Khaldūn Center for Development Studies and the Arab Organization for Human Rights (AOHR) in Egypt.
Side A:
Dr. Sa‘d al-Dīn ʾĪbrāhīm was part of a round table discussion with political parties, including the Muslim Brotherhood and the Socialist Labour Party that has strong Islamist tendencies. Both parties were asking to establish an independent Egyptian committee. Ḥizb al-Tajammuʿ (National Progressive Unionist Party) later made the same request to the Ibn Khaldūn Center and together the parties formed a committee for election review. The committee consists of 7 NGOs and 50 independent public figures known for their credibility. ʾĪbrāhīm claims that the point of the committee is to restore faith in the elections and establish fair elections. The committee observes the behaviour of the government, candidates, and the voters themselves for three-weeks in the campaign period. ʾĪbrāhīm desires neutrality and objectivity and therefore invites all parties, regardless of his own political views. These parties include the Muslim Brotherhood, Ḥizb al-Wafd (Wafd Party), the Nasserist Party, Ḥizb al-Tajammuʿ (National Progressive Unionist Party) and the Socialist Labour Party. Even the ruling party, the National Democratic Party (Ḥizb al-Waṭanī al-Dimuqrāṭī or NDP for short) was invited by ʾĪbrāhīm, although none of the members showed up and he argues this is because of their title as ruling party, they feel as though they do not have the time for such small meetings.
As aforementioned, the committee aims at making sure that the elections are fair, hereby the minority groups should be included as well. The Copts in Egypt make up approximately 8 million of the population, but are underrepresented in the area of politics. An incident occurred in which an NDP member had a Coptic opponent, but did not recognise the Copt as an opponent or to even have a say. The committee confronted the NDP and the issue was later resolved. ʾĪbrāhīm argues that the committee does not merely detect corruption, but actually does something about it too.
One of the earliest complaints that the committee received was that Coptic candidates are not nominated by the NDP. Other parties nominate one or two Copts, which is still a relatively low number, but the NDP refuses to nominate a single Copt at all. There are a few Coptic independent candidates out there, but they believe that they would have more influence if they were allowed to join the NDP. Out of the 4050 candidates, only 18 of them who were Copts.
Side B:
Continuation of side A:
Dr. ʾĪbrāhīm believes the Egyptian culture is a tolerant one, but the political climate is poisoned. ʾĪbrāhīm claims that the government often seduces independent figures after the elections and persuades them into joining the NDP. This in turn raises the number of seats for the NDP in parliament. Besides the NDP, Islamist groups also discriminate Copts according to ʾĪbrāhīm. They rob Copts (as well as the government), and justify their actions by calling it an act of istiḥlāl. Istiḥlāl is a term used in Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) that refers to the act of regarding an action as permissible. The term derives from the word ḥālāl.
Additionally, there is the phenomenon of protection money. In Upper Egypt, it is not uncommon for a man to reach out to a tribe or well-respected family and ask them for their help. In return, these individuals are supposed to be loyal to the tribes, but are not expected to pay them money. In urban areas, the phenomenon of protection money is much more prevalent.
