Darrag: Drafting of Egypt’s Constitution End of This Week

Darrag: Drafting of Egypt’s Constitution End of This Week

 Dr. Amr Darrag, Secretary-General of the Constituent Assembly (CA) tasked with writing Egypt’s new national charter, affirmed that: "All CA suggestions committees have completed their work. Suggestions will be referred to the Drafting Committee this weekend. Then they will be submitted to a general CA meeting for final selection.

"The committees took into account all suggestions and complaints submitted to the CA through its official website on the Internet. The findings of the committees will be discussed in an unbiased manner. The new Constitution will certainly be for all Egyptian society."

Furthermore, Dr. Mohamed Mohieddin, Rapporteur of the System of Governance Committee (SGC), said: "On Tuesday, in a special session, the CA will consider the fate of the Shura Council, whether the new Constitution should abolish or retain it, deciding on the matter by a formal vote during a plenary session of the CA.

"If the CA decides to keep the Shura Council in the Constitution, the SGC will then prepare the appropriate constitutional framework for it.

"There are two views within the SGC regarding the Shura Council. The first is that it should be abolished, due to the huge budget it requires, which is a heavy burden, especially since it had no real powers in the previous period.

"On the other hand, the second view is that the Shura Council must stay on, so two Houses of Parliament should share legislative power – rather than allowing the People’s Assembly to monopolize that power – in order to achieve stability and prevent a dictatorship of one chamber; though Shura Council membership should be limited to technocrats with clear competencies and proven expertise, making it the think-tank of the Egyptian State."