Egypt: Islamists Outraged After Court Orders Parliament Dissolution
It was a black Thursday for Egyptian Islamists. In quick succession, two decisions issued by the Supreme Constitutional Court threaten to nullify their hopes to win the presidential elections after their triumph in the parliamentary elections.
The Court first rejected a bill that would have prevented Ahmed Shafik, as a former senior official in the Mubarak regime, to stand in the presidential election, on Saturday and Sunday.
The Court also invalidated a third of the 498 seats in parliament, claiming that certain rules applied in parliamentary elections last winter were unconstitutional. This decision will, de facto, lead to the dissolution of the lower house of parliament in its entirety because it has not been elected according to “constitutional requirements” and that its composition was “completely illegal”.
In practice this means that it is the ruling military council would take over the legislative power until the election of a new People’s Assembly is being held.
Islamists expressed anger over the rulings claimin they were equivalent to a coup. The former Islamist presidential candidate Abdel Moneim Abu Fotouh said in a statement posted on Facebook, also mentioned a decision from yesterday taken by the government, which grants the military police and intelligence services of the army the power to arrest civilians and bring them to justice.
“Maintaining the candidate of the army (in the race) and the overthrow of the elected parliament after giving the military police the right to make arrests is a real coup and anyone who thinks that millions of young people will leave this coup is wrong, “he wrote.
