Politics in Egypt begins in the courts and ends in the courts. Thus, the presidential elections scheduled on the coming May 23 are threatened with cancellation, due to the decision by the judicial commission supervising these elections to refer the amendments that were introduced to the law on the exercise of political rights, also known as the “exclusion law”, to the Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC), and to return Air Marshal Ahmed Shafik to the list of those competing for the presidential seat. Thus, if the SCC were to rule that the amendments are in keeping with the constitution, and to issue its ruling after the results of the elections have been announced and Shafik has won, Egypt would have a president deprived of political rights! If on the other hand the SCC were to decide to refuse to rule on the amendments, as it did when the Military Council referred them to it, then the elections would be threatened with suspension, until this judicial predicament can be resolved. The Parliament itself is threatened with dissolution as well, as a case has also been filed with the SCC regarding the extent of its legality – a case filed by lawyers and activists who considered that the system on the basis of which the parliamentary elections were held disagrees with the Constitutional Declaration, as political parties monopolized parliament seats and competed over them, at the expense of the rights of independents, who represent the majority among the masses of the Egyptian people. The Appeal Commission of the Supreme Constitutional Court is scheduled to initiate effective procedures to look into the case on May 6. The Administrative Judicial Court had previously invalidated the formation of the constitutive assembly to draft the constitution and placed all political forces – in particular the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, and the Salafist Al-Nour Party – before a difficult choice, that of accepting for the constitutive assembly to be formed entirely from outside the parliament, despite the efforts that were exerted to agree over a solution to this political/judicial issue – and yet the problem still stands. It is also before courts of law that politics are shaped every day. Indeed, there are dozens of cases in which the accused are prominent figures of the former regime or people implicated with it in various issues. They are being tried, while the families of victims or those who were harmed by the actions of the Mubarak regime are expecting unusually harsh rulings to be issued. It is also based on a judicial ruling that Engineer Khairat El-Shater and Doctor Ayman Nour were excluded from the competition over the presidential seat. And it is because of other judicial rulings that parliamentary elections were repeated in several districts. All of this is happening because the forces active on the political stage in Egypt compete over everything, and refuse to agree over or to share anything. The picture seems to indicate that these parties suffer from political adolescence, as they behave without taking into account the reactions of others parties, their interests or their influence in the street. They act as if they were alone on the scene or as if they considered that they alone had made the Revolution and are therefore entitled to devour its cake. It is true that the political roadmap towards establishing a secular state is moving forward with difficulty, which could satisfy some as long as it is moving at all, but this does not mean that there is any likelihood for it to stop, whether with regard to the legislative branch of government (the Parliament) or the presidential elections (the President). And there is a prevalent feeling among citizens that politicians have ruined the Revolution; that the people, who paid the price of Mubarak's rule, are paying the price of the struggle of the elites and the politicians; and that the Revolution against the Mubarak regime needed another revolution against the methods of political parties, movements and forces, which engage in the same practices, seek to monopolize and hoard power, and do not stop excluding their rivals – all of which were the vices engaged in by the Mubarak regime for over 30 years. The picture of the political stage in Egypt seems as if it has turned into a big circus, in which mix cards, players, magical instruments and attempts to perform extraordinary feats, while the public finds nothing to attract their attention but the feeling that danger looms not over the players alone, but over them too, and that it could go as far as to swallow up the stage with everyone in it.
