A new popular campaign has thrown its support behind President Hosni Mubarak for a sixth consecutive presidential term, with his son Gamal as second choice. According to campaign coordinator Dakher Abdellah, the “Egypt Aspires for a New Beginning” campaign was launched after recent statements by Ali Eddin Helal, media secretary for the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), that Mubarak would be the party candidate in the 2011 presidential elections. The campaign has donated up to LE200,000 and 200 kg of meat to the poor residents of Menshiyat Nasser and al-Gammaliya in Cairo on the occasion of Eid al-Adha (The feast of sacrifice) which runs through this week. The donations, Abdellah said, came from businessmen attempting to muster support for Mubarak's presidential candidacy. The 82-year-old Mubarak is thought by some to be grooming his son Gamal--head of the NDP's influential Policies Secretariat--as a presidential successor, a move that would be widely rejected by political opposition movements. Others however believe that internal rifts within the NDP have forestalled plans to transfer power to Gamal and created uncertainty about Egypt's political future. Translated from the Arabic Edition.
