The Supreme Administrative Court on Sunday ruled that so-called remnants of the Hosni Mubarak regime could run in the coming parliamentary elections, as well as other elections, as long as they meet the conditions for nomination.
The same court that ruled to disband Mubarak’s National Democratic Party in April 2011. In its rationale, the court noted that no citizen should be denied the right to participate in politics.
The ruling expresses the stance of the Egyptian judiciary, which has continuously rejected classifying any Mubarak regime members as feloul, the Arabic word for “remnants” that is often used to describe them.
This is the second time this year that a court ruling has overturned laws to enable Mubarak-era figures to compete for office.
The first ruling was on 14 June, when the Supreme Constitutional Court overturned a political isolation law passed by Parliament in an attempt to strip feloul of their political rights.That law would have meant that anyone who had served in the former regime as president, vice president, prime minister, head of the NDP, or a member of its executive committee or political bureau, could not run for political office for 10 years.
The Supreme Constitutional Court’s overturning of the law enabled Ahmed Shafiq, the last prime minister under Mubarak, to run in the presidential election runoff.
Last week, 77 former NDP members announced that they would run in the upcoming parliamentary elections as the People's Congress Alliance.
In the last parliamentary contest, 17 feloul won independent seats. The Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, by contrast, took 236 seats, and the Salafi-oriented Nour Party took 121.
