The End of Politics in Egypt or a Preface for Bequeathing Power?

Is it the end of politics in Egypt or is it just the end of The Wafd Party? This is the main comment on the deplorable incidents that took place in the headquarters of El-Wafd Party on the 1 April 2006. Violence was triggered when Dr Aymen Jomaa’s supporters broke in the party’s headquarters by force and took it over. When the rival front, Dr Mahmoud Abaza’s supporters, who call themselves reformists (they had ousted Dr Jomaa from the leadership of the party before and have been engaged with him in a judiciary and political battles), Dr Jomaa’s supporters fired at random, leading to the injury of 27 people, including 7 journalists working in the party’s newspaper. The row resulted in arresting Noaman Jomaa with a number of his supporters, in addition to the burning of big parts of the party’s headquarters.

The matter is not at all so simple; its political repercussions are very important: How come that the means of communication in the biggest and oldest liberal opposition party in Egypt –established in the early twentieth century – be that of bullets and swords? Shouldn’t dialogue and elections be the more convenient alternative? Does that mean that the very idea of liberalism is ridicule in that the Egyptian reality does not support it or is it a conflict between old families in the party with new middle and smaller ones such as Noaman Jomaa’s?

Anyway, reaching such an end is a kind of political degradation and the deplorable demise of the oldest Liberal party in Egypt. It is a new proof of the bankruptcy of Liberals. Some people may interpret the incidents by claiming that the political life in Egypt hasn’t reached maturity, and therefore, the government is right to deal with these parties as if they did not exist. In fact, such interpretation is seen by some other people as preparing the political stage in Egypt to bequeath Egyptian President’s son the presidency.zopinionz