Beltagy: Our Fight with Counter-Revolution, Not the Judiciary

Dr. Mohamed Beltagy, member of the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP)’s Executive Bureau, said that the head of the Egyptian Judges Club Ahmed Al-Zind’s blatant warning to the Shura Council to drop the amendment of the judiciary law is the strongest evidence yet that some judges overstep their judicial roles and storm the political scene in violation of the Constitution and several relevant laws.

"Some judges think theirs is an authority over and above that of the state itself. Ahmed Al-Zind supporters will probably consider disbanding the Shura Council (upper house of Egypt’s parliament, entrusted with legislative powers), as he threatened in a television interview Sunday, just like they disbanded the People’s Assembly (lower house of parliament)."

Dr. Beltagy said, "All this confirms that our battle is not with Egypt’s esteemed judiciary, as hostile media try to delude people into believing, but with the counter-revolution involving some of the people adversely affected by the revolution.

"In his absurd warning, Zind spoke of restricting legislative authority of the Shura Council to matters of ‘urgency and necessity’, despite the fact that nothing like that is stipulate in the Constitution – whose referendum Zind and his supporters refused to supervise."

The FJP lawmaker MP Beltagy further said, "In any event, both urgency and necessity conditions are met in this matter: the ‘Hamam Lands’ must be returned to their rightful owners without delay, the funds of ‘October Green Belt Land’ must be returned to the poor of the Egyptian people, and individuals who have evidently accepted illegal gifts (bribes) from State and other newspapers must be urgently prevented from causing further harm to this country’s honorable judiciary".

Dr. Beltagy was clearly referring to graft and other charges haunting Ahmed Al-Zind and Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud (Egypt’s ousted public prosecutor).