Muslim Brothers secure seats
2005-11-29 14:26
Cairo - Faced with the spectacular rise of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood in the latest polls, analysts differ on how the Islamist group could ever take power in the Arab world's most populous country.
However, commentators agreed that the Brotherhood founded in 1928 had already achieved remarkable gains after only two phases in the parliamentary elections, securing 76 seats with more likely in the final stage starting on Thursday.
Leading a welfare-oriented campaign under the slogan, "Islam is the solution", the Brotherhood had demonstrated its popular support base and rattled the ruling National Democratic Party's dominance.
Secular regime
The still officially banned movement would at best obtain 20 to 25% of the People's Assembly's 454 seats, imposing itself as the only alternative to the 24-year-old secular regime of President Hosni Mubarak.
Brotherhood spokesperson Issam al-Aryan said: "The Algerian scenario is impossible in Egypt, the Turkish model is imaginable, but we will witness an Egyptian solution."
The movement knew that its accession to power would not come in 2005 and had displayed a subtle mix of determination and patience, careful not to rush its seemingly inexorable ascension.
444 seats up for grabs
Aryan said: "Our goal today is participation, not victory." Aryan was an English-speaking doctor from the brotherhood's young guard, who was released recently from five months in prison.
The movement, which had mastered the art of compromise after being chronically repressed for half a century, only fielded around a third of the maximum 444 seats up for grabs in the polls. Ten seats were filled directly by the NDP.
Analyst Hugh Roberts, North Africa project director for the International Crisis Group think-tank, said: "It's a clever move, they don't want to directly confront the regime."
Roberts ruled out a scenario similar to that which saw Algeria's Islamic Salvation Front romp to electoral success in 1991 with 47% of seats in the first round of the legislative elections.
100 000 people dead
The army suspended the elections, disbanded the Islamist movement and the country was plunged into a civil war that left an estimated 100 000 people dead.
Aryan said: "Let's not compare Egypt with Algeria, it scares voters away."
Brotherhood politburo official Abdel Moneim Abul Futuh was equally keen to avoid such parallels: "Power? Not until another 50 years".
But, Egyptian analyst Amr Shubaki, from the al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic studies, argued that the Muslim Brotherhood definitely had a conquest agenda.
He said: "The paradox today is that the NDP is only an organ of the current regime and the Muslim Brothers are organised like a proper party, despite not having the right to be one."