The General Coordinator of Egypt’s National Dialogue, Diaa Rashwan, on Saturday August 5, 2023, revealed that the dialogue’s Board of Trustees would submit three proposed electoral systems to the country’s president Abdel Fattah Al-sisi, one of which will be used to hold Egypt’s parliamentary elections scheduled for 2025.
Rashwan explained that the board’s first recommendation was to maintain the existing closed-party list system, whereby 50 percent of the House of Representatives and the Senate’s members are elected in four central districts.
The second recommendation was to adopt a proportional list system to elect all the House and Senate members in 15 districts.
The board’s third recommendation was to combine the three election systems – individual, closed, and open proportional lists – so that 50 percent of MPs and senators get elected using the first, 25 percent using the second, and 25 percent using the third.
Rashwan noted that the board will submit these recommendations to President El-Sisi for a final decision.
He also explained that the specialized committees are finalizing recommendations on laws regulating the exercising of political rights, the free handling of information, and the establishment of the anti-discrimination committee.
The committees will also produce final recommendations on challenges facing cooperatives and guardianship over money and children.
AUC professor Mostafa Kamel El-Sayed, assistant rapporteur of the Political Committee, stated that “while a closed-door meeting was held two weeks ago to discuss recommendations on election laws regulating parliamentary polls, this week’s meeting will focus on finalizing recommendations on the laws regulating local councils’ elections.”
El-Sayed noted that the participants in the national dialogue’s public sessions differed greatly over what election systems should be adopted in conducting both parliamentary and local councils’ elections.
“While some participants favoured a closed party list system for elections, others preferred an open list system,” he said.
The assistant rapporteur further noted that “under the closed list system, the party which secures more than 50 percent of votes in a district wins all of its seats, but in the open list system a party wins seats in proportion to the number of votes it secures.”
El-Sayed also highlighted that “the specialized committee’s closed-door meeting to be held this week will be devoted to ensuring that the adopted election system goes in line with the constitution, which stipulates that marginalized groups such as women, workers, farmers, youths, Christians, disabled people, and expats are fairly represented on the party lists.”
Health & taxes
On the other hand, Hassan Khalil, the assistant rapporteur of the Health Committee, revealed that a specialized committee will also hold a meeting this week on Egypt’s health insurance system.
“The past weeks saw extensive discussions on this system that resulted in drafting four recommendations in this respect, all of which call upon the government to extend the system to cover all of Egypt as soon as possible,” said Khalil.
He added, “The health committee will hold sessions on medical education, drugs, and human resources in the health sector.”
Talaat Abdel-Qawi, a member of the National Dialogue’s Board of Trustees, said the board decided two weeks ago to form specialized committees for each of the National Dialogue’s political, economic and social axes.
According to Abdel-Qawi, these committees shall be responsible for preparing and finalizing the recommendations that follow each round of public sessions.
