Political system of Egypt

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Egypt has been in a transition phase since 2011, and there is still no valid constitution. Long-time President Husni Mubarak was overthrown in February 2011. President Mohammed Morsi, who came into office through the first free elections but was authoritarian, was overthrown in a military coup in 2013. Since then, the military commander Abd al-Fattah as-Sisi , whose term of office was extended by referendum in June 2019, has been in power. De jure, a semi-presidential system of government is envisaged.

Democracy and civil rights are de facto even after the repeal of the Emergency Act (Law No. 162 from 1958), which came into force again after the assassination of Anwar al-Sadat in 1981 and was applied until 2012 (on May 11, 2010 again for two years extended), extremely limited.

Constitution

According to Article 1 of the Egyptian Constitution of September 11, 1971, Egypt is a “socialist democratic state” and “part of the Arab nation”.

In 1980, 2005 and 2007 this constitution was revised by amendments or new articles were added. Among other things, the term "socialist" was deleted. This passage (Part I / Art.1) now reads: "The Arab Republic of Egypt is a democratic state ...".

The Islam is the state religion (art. 2); the multi-party system is anchored in Article 5 of the constitution. Various civil rights are guaranteed in Articles 40–63 of the Constitution .

Institutions

president

According to Article 73 of the Constitution, the head of state is the President with the following powers:

• appoints and dismisses his / her deputy and the government (prime minister and minister) (Art. 141),
• he is the commander in chief of the armed forces (Art. 150),
• he issues ordinances and concludes contracts, which then have the character of a law (Articles 147 and 151)
• he declares a state of emergency; this may only be of a limited duration - unless the people's assembly ( madschlis asch-schaab ) agrees to a time extension (Art. 148).

According to Article 76 of the Constitution, a presidential candidate must be proposed by a third of the MPs to the People's Assembly. If the candidate has received two thirds of the votes in the following vote in parliament, a referendum is called in which an absolute majority of the votes is necessary. The Egyptian President's term of office is six years; the number of terms of office is not limited (Art. 77). All Egyptians over the age of 16 are eligible to participate in the presidential referendum. Opposing candidates have only been envisaged since the 2005 constitutional reform.

The last president, Muhammad Husni Mubarak , was deputy defense minister, vice president and deputy chairman of the ruling National Democratic Party (Hizb al-watani ad-dimuqrati) under Anwar as-Sadat . One week after Sadat's assassination in 1981, he was constitutionally conferred the office of president. From 1982 on, he also chaired the NDP. In the presidential referenda of 1981, 1987 and 1993 Mubarak was confirmed in office with more than 90 percent of the votes, and the referendums of 1999 and 2005 also confirmed him. His term of office ended on February 11, 2011 after nearly three weeks of public protests.

houses of Parliament

The Egyptian Parliament ( Egyptian People's Assembly ) is the legislative body under Article 86 of the Constitution, whose members are elected for five years under Article 92. At least half of the members must be workers and farmers (Art. 87). The current electoral law from 1987 is decisive for the elections to the People's Assembly. All Egyptians from the age of 18 are entitled to vote, but the right to stand as a candidate is only acquired after the age of 30. Police and military personnel are not eligible to vote. According to Law No. 38 of 1972, the total number of people-elected deputies is 444. In addition, there are (at most) 10 deputies, who are appointed by the President.

Since 1990, the number of constituencies has been 222, with two members being elected in each constituency (by majority vote). Two candidates from the same party can run in each constituency. Each of the 26 governorates has at least two constituencies. In elections, Article 87 of the Constitution already applies at constituency level, which specifically means that the candidate with the second most votes may have to step down in favor of a worker or peasant. Every voter is obliged to vote for two different candidates.

The Egyptian parliament has a second chamber, the “Consultative Assembly” ( Majlis asch-Shura ) or “Shura Council”, whose function is comparable to that of the British House of Lords .

Does an elected member of parliament divorce B. by death, then by-elections are held in the constituency concerned.

Parties

→ Main article : List of political parties in Egypt

The National Democratic Party (NDP) ( Hizb al-watani al-dimuqrati ) ruled the country until the revolution in January 2011 . After that, the military council took power, which did not schedule elections until late summer 2011, but then postponed them. The elections began in late November 2011 and were carried out in three steps. They ended in June 2012 with the election of Mohammed Morsi as president.

Regulations

Law No. 40 of 1977, which was amended in 1978, applies to the admission of parties. According to this, each party must recognize Islamic law ( Sharia ) as the “main source of legislation” and commit to upholding “national unity” and “social peace”. The “socialist democratic system” and the “socialist achievements” must also be recognized. The party may not make any exclusive reference to a specific religion , race , language , profession or gender in its program . Thus, Islamist or minority parties, such as B. the Christian Copts , not allowed.

Parties in Egypt are not allowed to be offshoots of foreign parties, which also applies to parties in other Arab countries such as the Ba'ath . The parties are also not allowed to be financed from abroad. Finally, newly founded parties must clearly differentiate themselves from the programs of existing parties and their ideologies. 50 founding members are required for a new establishment; Of these, however, 20 must belong to the popular assembly and 25 must be workers or farmers by profession . A party committee made up predominantly of members of the NDP decided on admission until the 2011 revolution.

Party law

After the 2011 revolution , changes were made to the party law. With the revision of the Supreme Military Council , the previously applicable "Law on Political Parties" (Law No. 40/1977 "The political parties law" , along with the changes made in 2005 by Law 177/2005) was in some parts repealed or changed (Art. 4, 6 (I), 7, 8, 9, 11 and 17)

The - now applicable - provisions (extracts):

Art.4 / 2 The principles, goals, programs, policies and / or methods of the activities of a party must not conflict with the basic principles of the constitution or the requirements for preserving Egypt's national security, the unity of the nation, social peace and the democratic system .

Art.4 / 3 The principles, programs, methods of the activities of a party or [the composition] of its leadership and its members may not be based on religion, [belonging to] a social class, a religious community, a [certain] profession or the geographic origin, gender, language, or birth [based].

Art.4 / 4 A party may not create military or para-military formations.

Art.4 / 5 A party may not be part of a foreign party or organization.

Art.4 / 6 A party should disclose its principles, goals, methods, organization as well as its financial resources and their origin.

Art.7 A party should announce its founding by writing to the Committee on Political Parties (PPC) (for the PPC, see Art.8). A list with the signatures of 5,000 founding members must be presented.

The importance and influence of the Political Parties Committee (PPC), which has been active since 1977, has been weakened. The committee has still not been dissolved, but the committee members have been completely replaced. In terms of its composition and its powers, the originally 7-member, since 2005 9-member PPC was a compliant instrument of the President or the ruling NDP party to shape and control the political landscape of Egypt entirely in his / her own way. All committee members were - until the current regulation - appointed directly or indirectly by the Egyptian president. According to the changes made to Article 8 , the committee will now consist exclusively of lawyers: the first Vice-President of the Court of Cassation as chairman, two further delegates of the Court of Cassation, two chairmen of the Court of Appeal and two delegates of the Council of State.

Art.17 The chairman of the PPC can - after consultation with all members of the committee - cause the Supreme Administrative Court to dissolve an [already existing] party ... if the party can be proven that it violates Article 4 of this electoral law has violated.

Muslim Brotherhood

In addition to the parties, there is another important movement that has repeatedly made it into parliament: the Muslim Brotherhood Community ( Jamaat al-ichwan al-muslimin ). This was founded in 1928 by the teacher Hassan al-Banna and calls for a return to traditional values ​​under the slogan “Islam is the solution” ( al-islam huwa al-hall ) while rejecting Western ideologies that are perceived as alien to the Islamic community . In a political context, the Muslim Brotherhood is calling for the introduction of Islamic law, including the hadd punishments .

The Muslim Brotherhood was officially banned in Egypt, but it succeeded - through nominally independent candidates - in the popular assembly several times. In 1987 the Muslim Brotherhood even formed the strongest opposition group. While the ban on Egyptian courts has continued to be upheld, in the 1995 election, some Muslim Brotherhood candidates were arrested. Nevertheless, 150 “independents” were running for this movement, which was linked to attacks on tourists in the 1990s.

The Muslim Brotherhood has around 1 million active members and runs various charitable institutions such as hospitals and social centers, especially in the poorer districts. Feeding the poor and creating jobs for young people have meant that the Muslim Brotherhood has received support from the underprivileged in particular.

Established opposition parties

The most important opposition parties are:

• the New Wafd Party ( Hizb al-wafd al-dschadid ), which was founded in 1977 as the Wafd party and was reconstituted in 1984; it has around 2 million members and represents a rather conservative national liberal policy.
• The Liberal Socialist Party ( Hizb al-ahrar al-ishtiraki ); this has 65,000 members and pursues a conservative-liberal policy.
• The National Progressive Unionist Rally Party ( Hizb at-tajammu alwatani at-taqaddumi al-wahdawi ); this follows a socialist-Marxist course and has around 150,000 members.

The other parties are insignificant splinter groups who, apart from the socialist-pan- Arabian Arab-Democratic Nasserist Party, are not represented in parliament. For example, there is also a Green Party in Egypt ( Hizb al-chudr al-misri ).

literature

• Hatem Elliesie: The Rule of Law in Egypt (PDF; 246 kB). In: Matthias Koetter, Gunnar Folke Schuppert (Ed.): Understanding of the Rule of Law in various Legal Orders of the World: Working Paper Series No. 5 of the SFB 700: Governance in Areas of Limited Statehood. Berlin 2010.
• Bertelsmann Transformation Index: Country Report Egypt (594 kB), Gütersloh 2009.
• Sherifa D. Zuhur: Egypt: Security, Political, and Islamist Challenges. (594 kB), Strategic Studies Institute of the US Army War College, October 2007.
• Ulrich Wurzel: Country Analysis Egypt. In: Sigrid Faath (Ed.): Stability problems of central states: Egypt, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan and the regional effects . Hamburg 2003.

Web links

• Constitutional Reform: Egyptian Repression Paragraphs. on: faz.net February 8, 2011.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Carnegie Endowment For International Peace: Carnegie Guide to Egypt's Elections: Emergency Law (Not all articles of the Emergency Law) ( Memento of the original of November 21, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
2. ^ The Emergency Law in Egypt. ( Memento of the original from December 9, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Egypt News. May 19, 2010. 
3. ^ Egyptian repression paragraphs. on: faz.net February 8, 2011.
4. ↑ Michael A. Lange: Regime Change in Egypt?  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung eV November 27, 2002  
5. ^ Michael A. Lange: Early extension of the Egyptian emergency laws. Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung eV March 5, 2003
6. ^ Government / Egypt: Egypt Constitution (as of 1971) (English)
7. ↑ Government / Egypt: Modernizing the Constitution of Egypt: Egypt Constitution (as of 1971) (English) and further information ( Memento of the original from February 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
8. ↑ Carnegie Endowment For International Peace: Carnegie Guide to Egypt's Elections: Constitutional and Legal Framework (bottom of the page: pdf: Egyptian Constitution - as amended to 2007) ( Memento of the original from November 21, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was used automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
9. ^ Carnegie Endowment For International Peace: Carnegie Guide to Egypt's Elections March 23, 2007: Egypt's Constitutional Amendments
10. ↑ Egyptian Government (Sharaf), press release March 23, 2011: The 3rd meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers ( Memento of the original from January 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
11. ^ Die Zeit March 23, 2011: New Laws. Egypt restricts the right to demonstrate and to strike.
12. ↑ For the electoral law in force so far, see UNHCR / Human Rights Watch January 4, 2007: Monopolizing Power: Egypt's Political Parties Law
13. ^ Egypt State Information Service March 29, 2011: Summary of the Main Features of the Amended Law on Political Parties - s. pdf
14. ^ The Daily News Egypt March 28, 2011 Emergency law to be lifted before September parliamentary elections, says army
15. ↑ Egypt State Information Service March 23, 2011: The 3rd meeting of the Cabinett of Ministers - Item 6 ( Memento of the original from January 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
16. ^ Egypt State Information Service April 3, 2011: The Main Features of the Amended Law on Political Parties
17. ↑ UNHCR / Human Rights Watch January 4, 2007: Monopolizing Power: Egypt's Political Parties Law. Here: p. 7 and F.26
18. ↑ Bertelsmann Transformation Index: Country Report Egypt  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.