Elections and Eid celebrations preoccupy most of today’s newspapers, with independent Al-Tahrir describing on its front page the festivities inside the hospital room where deposed President Hosni Mubarak is being held.
Mubarak, dressed in a khaki tracksuit, requested ostrich meat as his Eid meal but was overruled by his wife Suzanne for health reasons. The ex-president received numerous phone calls from well-wishers during the day, Al-Tahrir tells us. “While it is normal that figures from the former regime would call, what is strange is that currently serving government figures called him, such as the current Environment Minister Maged George … Current Electricity and Energy Minister Hassan Younis left a message of greetings.”
Mubarak also received a half hour call from Tora prison, during which former People’s Assembly Speaker Fathi Sorour is reported to have said, “Don’t worry president, the elections are a complete mess and will explode.”
Al-Tahrir quotes an unnamed source as saying that is evidence that “a huge catastrophe” will happen during the elections.
In Upper Egypt, meanwhile, is witnessing a “war of destructive election propaganda,” particularly between figures with connections to the dissolved National Democratic Party (NDP) and Islamist candidates.
Al-Tahrir also continues its series, “Islamists of the Arab Spring: From the dictator’s prisons to the seat of power.” In an article titled, “The bearded ones’ road to power … paved with worries,” the paper asks whether, while Arabs might support Islamists in the face of oppression and dictatorship, they feel the same way after the revolution?
The paper suggests that they do not, because “they fear [Islamists’] ascent to power” despite “their innate religious nature.”
Privately owned Al-Shorouk declares on its front page that Islamists are threatening to organize a million-man protest on 18 November against the draft document of supra-constitutional principles introduced by Deputy Prime Minister Ali al-Selmy last week. Many have fiercely criticized the document as an attempt by the military to expand and entrench its powers.
Wasat (Center) Party deputy leader Essam Sultan is quoted as saying, “It is clear from the actions of the [ruling] Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) that it wishes to either stay in power or control power indirectly.”
The Nour Party will take part in the protest scheduled for 18 November “in large numbers,” said Yousry Hammad, spokesman for the Salafi-led party.
Islamist preacher Mohamed Hassan warned against “an endless war" between Islamic political currents while at Mount Arafat on pilgrimage, Al-Shorouk also reports.
Hassan criticized attempts to divide the military and the Egyptian people, warning, “If the military collapsed like the police force collapsed, no Egyptian in their bedroom would be safe even if he closed all the windows of his home.”
There is continuing confusion about the logistics and legal process of Egyptians abroad voting in the upcoming elections, Al-Shorouk reports, following a court verdict issued last week upholding the right of expatriate Egyptians to vote.
The confused way in which the High Elections Commission is trying to implement [the court decision] confirms that they know nothing about elections or organizing them,” lawyer Negad al-Borei is quoted as saying, adding that this risks abroad votes being declared invalid because of procedural irregularities.
Director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies Bahey Eddin Hassan writes movingly in Al-Shorouk about his son-in-law, Alaa Abd El Fattah, currently detained in Tora prison on charges of attacking army personnel and stealing weapons at the Maspero incidents on 9 October, when 27 protesters were either shot or crushed to death by army armed personnel carriers.
