Egypt - can democracy be boxed in?

We have frequently commented on the fate of democracy in the Arab world. In the past we commented on the arrest of Ayman Nour in Egypt and the stands taken in his favour by the EU, the European Parliament and other human rights watchers around the world. The United States had also raised the issue of his arrest with Cairo.

Later, Mr Nour was released and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak also announced changes in the Egyptian Constitution, which will open the way to contested Presidential elections.

This year each registered political party will be free to field a candidate. But in future elections, presumably in 2011, additional hurdles will have to be overcome.

From then on only parties which will have been licensed for five years and which command about five per cent of the seats in the lower and upper houses of parliament, will be allowed to field a candidate.

Independent candidates will have to be endorsed by 250 elected officials. Since the ruling National 'Democratic' Party (NDP) controls some 90 per cent of seats in both houses of the Egyptian Parliament and about 98 per cent of the seats on provincial councils this may prove quite impossible to secure.

The banned Muslim Brotherhood has not been placated by these 'reforms'. Protests held in several parts of Egypt on May 4 led to the arrest of 1,500, according to the Muslim Brotherhood; the authorities put the figure at 400.

On May 6 the Egyptian authorities arrested Issam Aryan, the official spokesman of the Muslim Brotherhood's Supreme Council or guide.

Meanwhile judges are also up in arms. Meeting in Alexandria, a thousand judges declared that they will not supervise the upcoming Presidential elections unless new laws are passed guaranteeing the full independence of the judiciary.

The judges were allowed to supervise the election in 2000, but their role was minimal. They could not prevent the widespread irregularities. They are requesting an independent budget and that the judiciary be placed under the rule of an independent council to free it from direct government control.

President Mubarak promised press reform back in February 2004, adding that prison sentences for journalists convicted of libel will be removed. That law has not been enacted yet and on April 17 the Cairo Criminal Court sentenced three journalists to a year's imprisonment and fined them 10,000 Egyptian pounds (about $1,700) for libelling Housing Minister Ibrahim Suleiman.

As a member of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, and a signatory to a free trade accord with the EU, Egypt is committed to the observance of human rights and democratic principles.

But though the European Parliament has been urging concrete measures against countries that fail in their commitments, the EU's governments have been reluctant to press their case.

Egypt is the biggest country in the Arab world and the richest culturally, with a large strata of highly educated and internationally respected intellectuals of all kinds, who have given their country international fame and who are struggling to modernise their homeland.