CAIRO - The ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) has repeatedly rejected calls for foreign monitoring of the People's Assembly elections (the Lower House of the Egyptian Parliament) on November 28. The NDP justified its objection by saying that monitoring represents a violation of the State' sovereignty. The opposition parties and human rights organisations disagreed. While the popular opposition movement “Kifaya” not only announced its support of international controls, it asked the relevant international organisations directly to monitor the elections. The whole nation is on tenterhooks, witnessing the coming legislative elections and the presidential elections next year. These two events constitute a turning point in Egypt's future, according to observers. The legislative elections are about selecting the members of the People's Assembly for the next five years, and it seems that President Hosni Mubarak will nominate himself as a candidate of the NDP in the presidential elections. While opposition parties won't support specific candidates, they expect Mohamed el-Baradei to nominate himself. Leaders of opposition parties, including Ayman Nur and Hamdin Sabahi, have announced to stand, but Sabahi only if the constitution is changed. There is disagreement among the opposition parties concerning the demand for monitoring. While the banned Muslim Brotherhood, Al-Ghad, Kifaya and a number of human rights organisations called for international monitoring, Al- Wafd and the Nasserist parties refused to do so. The progressive National Unionist Party supported international monitoring but only if under United Nations supervision, due to illegal practices. NDP leaders see international monitoring as a violation of the State' sovereignty. Zakaria Azmi, prominent leader of the NDP, stressed in Al-Ahrar opposition newspaper that the civil community has the ability to control local elections. NDP member Mohammed Kamal was also against it, claiming that the Party has no idea about the foreign observers' agenda, in addition to the fact that large numbers of foreign observers would be required. As conditions in Egypt are always in the spotlight, the European Union actually asked the Government to allow observer teams to monitor both the parliamentary and presidential polls. While the Government has postponed its reply to the European Union's demand, it announced the NDP leaders' objection. The Project on Middle Eastern Democracy (POMED) based in Washington, an American organisation concerned with spreading democracy in the Middle East, has called on the US Administration to pressure officials in Cairo to accept international monitors. The demands of foreign organisations were welcomed by the opposition, independent nominees and human rights associations. About 87 opposition parliamentarians, activists and public figures asked the European Union to supervise the coming elections, although no foreign delegation can do so without the Government's agreement. For his part, Secretary-General of the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights, an NGO, Hafez Abu Seda stressed that there is an urgent need for international monitoring and that the Government should allow foreign observers in order to prove its good intentions towards reform. He added that Egypt sent election observers to a number of countries, such as Yemen, Algeria, Palestine, Sudan, South Africa, Ukraine and Guinea.
