With the slogan “Gamal Mubarak: The Dream of the Poor”, Magdy al-Kordy and his agents are touring Egypt’s slums and low-income neighborhoods hoping to convince at least five million Egyptians to endorse Gamal Mubarak as Egypt’s next president.
“What distinguishes Gamal Mubarak is the fact that he is well-versed in Egyptian realities,” said al-Kordy. “He represents the young generation and seeks to ensure a better life for poor Egyptians.” said al-Kordy, founder of “Popular Coalition to Support Gamal Mubarak”.
Last month, the campaign kicked off in Sayyeda Zeinab, one of Cairo’s oldest neighborhoods. Gamal’s photos were posted on the doors of mechanic workshops, juice stores and façades of wonky few-story houses in tiny alleys.
“Gamal is a good man. He is not a snob. We find him in all football games among people,” said Sabah Hassan, who sells engine oil in Sayedda Zeinab few miles away from Cairo’s main slaughterhouse.
The question of hereditary succession sounds quite logical to the 54-year-old widow. “I sell oil. If anything happens to me, my son will take over because he knows the job. By the same token, Gamal should succeed his father,” added Sabah as she stood inside her modest store which hosts a poster reading "Gamal for all Egyptians".
Al-kordy, who makes a living off his coffee beans store in Mokkattam, admits his campaign was inspired by Gamal’s recent tours of poor villages–a move experts consider an attempt by the former banker to diffuse accusations that he prioritizes the interests of Egypt's elite.
However, not all the poor unconditionally swear allegiance to the president’s son. Some are too frustrated by Egypt's economic realities to buy political slogans.
“I do not think anyone is fit for the president’s position. I don’t think anyone could solve our problems.” said Ahmed Fathi.
Like thousands of his cohorts, the 28-year-old commerce school graduate has been jobless for the last five years. To make ends meet, he ended up selling juice at his father’s store in Zein al-Abedeen alley.
Surprisingly, al-Kordy does not hold a membership card of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). On the contrary, he was a member of the left-wing al-Tagammu opposition party. Upon his launch of the pro-Gamal campaign, al-Tagammu reportedly froze his membership.
Even more astonishingly, the 54-year-old former mechanic was a member of the Kefaya movement until 2009. For years, he was among the ranks of a group that spearheaded a staunch campaign against President Mubarak’s rule. Until last year, he was among those who warned against hereditary succession. Today, al-Kordy dismisses the term as a mere fabrication by an opportunistic intelligentsia.
“Hereditary succession is a lie made up by the elite,” al-Kordy told al-Masry al-Youm, “This elite is driven by personal interests and foreign agendas.”
Promoting the head of the NDP policies secretariat has recently become fashionable in slums areas. At least another two similar campaigns have been launched–one by a low-profile member of al-Wafd opposition party and another by an NDP member. Campaigners reportedly gave out T-shirts to the poor in exchange for signatures to support the 46-year-old politician.
Impoverished areas seem an easy grab to al-Kordy and his 8,000 followers. On one hand, the poor constitute the majority in a country where 20 percent of the population lives below the poverty line; on the other, the poor are not concerned with bigger reform issues championed by the sophisticated opposition, according to al-Kordy.
“These people want nothing but the minimal living requirements and we should respect the opinion of the majority,” said al-Kordy.
So far his campaign has hit el-Sharabeyya, Old Cairo, Dar al-Salam, Sayyeda Zeinab and a few other provinces in the Delta garnering 85,000 signatures, al-Kordy claimed.
When asked about his finances, al-Kordy said his campaign is funded from his own pocket and from donations made by one of his followers in the Delta Province of al-Sharqeyya. So far, the campaign has cost 50,000 Egyptians pounds, claimed al-Kordy.
While the NDP denies any link with these campaigns, rumors had it that one of them was financed by Ibrahim Kamel, a prominent businessman and a member of the NDP general secretariat.
Such allegations sound valid to Diaa Rashwan, an expert with al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic studies.
“This campaign must be sponsored by NDP low-rank leaders and some businessmen,” said Rashwan.
Pro-Gamal calls emerged in response to Mohamed ElBaradei’s grass-roots campaign that kicked off in July. Dozens of young men and women have been knocking on people’s doors nationwide urging them to sign off on a petition titled “Together for Change”. The statement sponsored by the former head of the UN nuclear watchdog, champions major reforms that the regime has been always reluctant to adopt. So far, the group has collected 800,000 signatures.
“Pro-Gamal campaigns are trying to project the false idea that people are okay with hereditary succession,” said Nasser Abdel Hamed, coordinator of ElBaradei’s campaign. “We have worked on the ground and realized that people do not approve of Gamal Mubarak or of the hereditary succession.”
For weeks, pundits were divided over whether these pro-Gamal slogans were a disguised attempt by the ruling regime to groom the NDP assistant secretary-general ahead of the presidential poll slated for fall 2011.
Last week, Safwat al-Sherif, the party’s secretary-general and a highly influential player in Mubarak’s regime, put an end to the speculation by affirming President Mubarak as the party’s candidate.
“I am saying it clearly and incontestably: President [Hosni] Mubarak is the only option and there is no one else,” al-Sherif told the independent Al-Osboa newspaper.
In the meantime, al-Sherif shrugged off the pro-Gamal campaign as “haphazard” and denied any link between the party and Gamal’s posters.
Al-Sherif’s “affirmative tone” refutes any speculation that Gamal was still an option, said Al Ahram's Rashwan. Such statements attest to a growing resistance to Gamal’s candidacy within the ruling regime, according to Rashwan.
“There is no indication that Hosni Mubarak is in favor of passing the presidency on to Gamal. He is promoting him in the public life but not as a potential president,” said Rashwan.
“Those who are around the president such as al-Sherif are very smart men and if President [Hosni] Mubarak had wanted Gamal, they would have got the message and there would not have been any resistance to Gamal inside the party,” explained Rashwan.
But Abdel Hamed, from ElBaradei’s group, cites the recent wave of pro-Gamal campaigns as evidence to suggest just the opposite.
“This is a dangerous campaign,” said Abdel Hamed. “It shows that there is a clear intention to start moving forward with the scenario of hereditary succession.”
Despite al-Sherif’s rejection, there has been no attempt by the NDP to silence pro-Gamal calls. According to Rashwan, the party is cautious not to take such measures in order to conceal NDP internal disputes. “They do not want to have an open and public fight over Gamal,” explained Rashwan.
Yet, this rift was clearly exposed last week after Ali Eddin Helal, NDP media secretary and one of Gamal’s closest advisors stated that Gamal’s candidacy remains an option.“If President Mubarak decides not to run, Gamal Mubarak is one of the people that could be considered [by the party],” Helal said.
But who to field in the 2011 presidential elections seems an irrelevant question to some including Kamal Aziz, a 62-year-old juice seller who migrated from Sohag to Cairo 40 years ago. “This is their country and they do whatever they want with it,” said Aziz in an upper Egyptian accent as he sat outside his store next to a poster reading “Join us to support Gamal”.
