Monday, Nov 26, 2012
By Sam Dagher
CAIRO--The political divide in Egypt widened as secular and liberal opposition forces raised pressure on President Mohammed Morsi to rescind an edict that consolidates his power and sidelines the judiciary.
Mr. Morsi's supporters, meanwhile, prepared for rallies Tuesday to preserve what the Muslim Brotherhood, the main Islamic party, called "legitimacy and stability."
Egypt's array of quarreling opposition groups has coalesced and formed a National Salvation Front to push back against Mr. Morsi's decree. The coalition--formed last week by secular and liberal political parties--is expanding to include youth groups and other revolutionary forces seeking to challenge Mr. Morsi's decisions and prevent what they say is an impending Islamist takeover of the government. The Front is expected to have significant leverage: Many groups are joining, and it is tapping rising fear among Egyptians of a Brotherhood takeover.
On Sunday, the opposition effort got a boost from the Egyptian Press Syndicate, which represents journalists at both state-owned and independent media. The union held a tense and boisterous meeting to denounce Mr. Morsi's decision and call for employees at state-owned newspapers to stop their printing presses in solidarity until Mr. Morsi rescinds the decree.
Top judges on Saturday described the decree as "an unprecedented assault" on judicial independence and called on judges to strike nationwide. Many courthouses in Cairo and other parts of the country were closed Sunday because of the strike, according to Egyptian state media. Mr. Morsi is scheduled to meet with senior judges on Monday to explain the scope of his decisions, said his spokesman Yassir Ali.
Egyptian shares plunged more than 9% Sunday, the first trading day since Mr. Morsi's decree, as the political tensions unnerved investors already jittery about the prospects for the economy. The benchmark EGX-30 Index closed down 9.6% at 4917.73, wiping out last week's modest gains, which followed the signing of a preliminary agreement on a $4.8 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.
Tensions were running high on Sunday. More than two dozen tents were pitched in Tahrir Square, where several hundred opponents of Mr. Morsi amassed. Nearby, young anti-Morsi protesters clashed with security forces for the seventh consecutive day, but this time the scene shifted to a road leading to the U.S. Embassy, which has been attacked in the past.
Protesters lobbed rocks and Molotov cocktails at security forces, which hit back with a barrage of teargas. Protesters set an abandoned Avis car-rental office in the area on fire.
The U.S. Embassy issued a statement saying some rocks had landed in its compound but that it didn't believe it was the target. It urged its personnel to remain indoors and warned U.S. citizens against coming to the embassy.
Amr Moussa, a 76-year-old Egyptian politician and candidate in the June presidential election that Mr. Morsi won, is among several former presidential candidates, including Mohamed ElBaradei, former chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, to join the National Salvation Front. It also includes youth leaders instrumental in the revolution that toppled the authoritarian regime of Hosni Mubarak in February 2011.
"Elections have taken place," Mr. Moussa said. "We are not asking for regime change but we are mobilizing to rescue Egypt because something seriously wrong has happened."
The Front's central demand is that Mr. Morsi scrap the decree, which makes all his decisions as president, past and future, immune from judicial review until a new constitution is approved, via referendum, to be held by February. Mr. Morsi acquired legislative powers after the Supreme Constitutional Court dissolved Parliament earlier this year when the country was ruled by an interim military council.
In addition to neutralizing the judiciary, many Egyptian politicians and analysts say Mr. Morsi's decree completely shields the Constitutional Assembly, the panel tasked with drafting the new constitution that has increasingly come under the sway of Mr. Morsi's allies in the Brotherhood, from being reconstituted or dissolved. The courts had been expected to consider dissolving the panel in the coming weeks.
Mr. Morsi and his allies say the decree was necessary to expedite a transitional period that has been shackled by what they call obstructionist opposition parties and remnants of the Mubarak regime.
Hassan Nafaa, a professor of political science at Cairo University, said the liberal and secular forces now banding together to confront Mr. Morsi are still beset by the problems that have stymied collective efforts until now: personal rivalries, conflicting ideologies and agendas, and a lack of common vision and grass-roots reach.
The groups were uniting to confront what they see as a naked power grab by the Muslim Brotherhood, the dominant party in Mr. Morsi's coalition, Mr. Nafaa said.
"I think we are going to see an escalation in the battle as each political force will test the strength of the other," he said.
Mr. Moussa, the former presidential candidate, was among some 20 members of the Constitutional Assembly, including representatives of Egyptian churches, to resign earlier this month over what he characterized as bullying and strong-arming by Mr. Morsi's Islamist allies on the panel. Mr. Morsi and his allies have denied the allegations.
"For me the straw that broke the camel's back is their push to include an article about society figures tasked with enforcing public morality," said Mr. Moussa.
Opposition groups have called for a million-strong gathering Tuesday in Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the uprising that toppled Mr. Mubarak. The Brotherhood, which initially called for a similar rally Tuesday in nearby Abdeen Square, on Sunday changed the venue to a public space in front of Cairo University, farther from the square, to avert clashes with Morsi opponents. "We call on all patriotic, revolutionary, youth and Islamist forces to join this million-strong rally in support of legitimacy and stability," said Brotherhood spokesman Mohammed Ghazlan.
On Sunday, the Brotherhood said a 15-year-old member was killed and 60 people were wounded when "thugs" tried to storm the party's headquarters in the city of Damanhour, north of Cairo.
Pressure from Washington on Mr. Morsi to repeal his decree also mounted over the weekend, despite the Egyptian leader's role in helping to negotiate a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas.
Some leading U.S. lawmakers, including Sen. John McCain (R., Az.), a former presidential candidate, are calling for the U.S. to halt financial assistance to Cairo if Mr. Morsi doesn't back away from instituting his constitutional amendments.
"We thank Mr. Morsi for his efforts in brokering the cease-fire with Hamas....But this is not what the United States of America's taxpayers expect," Sen. McCain said on "Fox News Sunday." "Our dollars will be directly related to progress toward democracy."
--Tim Falconer and Jay Solomon contributed to this article.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
26-11-12 0344GMT
