Sixty political parties assembled on Sunday at the headquarters of the liberal Wafd party to discuss the meeting which took place between 13 parties and the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) over the weekend. At the end, the majority of the parties declared their insistence on abiding by a much criticised agreement they reached with the military council.
While the liberal Egyptian Social Democratic Party did not sign the agreement on Saturday for technical reasons, its representative Mohamed Abou El-Ghar confirmed Monday the party’s agreement with the deal, assuring others that his signature will follow shortly. The signed agreement between some political parties and SCAF created an internal upheaval within almost every single party that signed on.
The party that experienced highest levels of internal divisions over the deal with SCAF was the liberal El- Adl Party, whose members issued official statements condemning their leadership.
Some El-Adl party members issued a statement criticising their representative Mostafa El-Naggar for signing.
The dissidents stated that, “The original demand for all parties was for a 100 per cent, unconditional party list, and amending Article 5 is not an accomplishment. The state of emergency has legally ended and for the council to state [in the signed document] that the council would consider ending the use of the emergency law with ‘the exception of applying it to particular crimes’ is unjustifiable.”
“Moreover, the ban on National Democratic Party members participating in politics should be applied to all of its former members and not merely some, as mentioned in the document.”
To those who signed the SCAF agreement, on the other hand, the meeting was a success in that it extracted some concessions from the council’s side.
Mohamed Morsi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) affiliated Freedom and Justice Party, on the other hand, defended his party’s approval of the document.
Full Article: Brotherhood and friends stick to their deal with SCAF despite uproar – Politics – Egypt – Ahram Online.