Democratic Alliance to Nominate 100 Public Figures in Upcoming Elections

The Electoral Coordination Committee of the Democratic Alliance for Egypt agreed at its second meeting Saturday at the Freedom and Justice Party headquarters to form two sub-committees; the first one will provide suggestions for minor changes to the law of the People’s Assembly and Shura Council, and then ask the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces to add such amendments to the law, and thus issuing a decree law on them.

The work of the second sub-committee will involve receiving the applications by the candidates who wish to run for parliament on the lists of the Alliance.

Dr. Wahid Abdel Meguid, head of the Electoral Committee, pointed out that the role of the Committee is to present the amendments to the law to the Military Council, with the focus on the exclusion of the text that stipulates that the candidate number one in the party list should be from the category of workers and peasants, and also not to compel parties to put a woman candidate in each list.

The aim is to simply identify a specific percentage of these categories as candidates on the lists, and to get the parties to be committed to this arrangement according to their individual circumstances.

Abdul-Meguid said that the situation does not call for or stipulate adding more amendments than the aforementioned ones, pointing out that the coalition will press towards the achievement of these amendments, while the political moves are expected to be carried out by the party leaders.

He added, "The committee receiving the applications is mandated to select the candidates, and this will take place through two lists: the first is the one involving public figures and the main candidates from the parties. This list will be handed over in the next meeting of the Electoral Coordination Committee, which is set to take place on September 13, 2011. He also pointed out that the number of candidates on this list would be up to 100 candidates. The second list is that of the rest of the potential candidates to run for the rest of the seats, after being selected by the coalition.

This meeting witnessed the distribution of a form to the parties called "the candidate card", which is going to carry the candidate’s data; and this would include all the potential candidates who would be nominated by the parties.