Brotherhood’s appeal begins to wane in Egypt
Brotherhood’s appeal begins to wane in Egypt
By Borzou Daragahi
To become the youngest president of the students’ union in the college of law at Cairo’s Ain Shams University, Mohamed Shaker did not have to do much. He just presented himself to fellow students as an opponent of everything the Muslim Brotherhood had done and stood for during its months of dominating campus and national politics.
“I put up signs saying, ‘The presidency, parliament and shura [consultative council] are enough! At least leave us the universities’,” the energetic 20-year-old boasted. “‘No to the Brotherhood,’ was our slogan.”
Across Egypt’s campuses and in some professional associations, the once formidable electoral prowess of the Muslim Brotherhood shows signs of waning in a trend that could have an impact on parliamentary elections due this year.
After overwhelming wins in student union elections last year, the Brotherhood looks likely to have a drastically reduced influence on campuses. Results compiled by the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression, an Egyptian rights group, also show the Brotherhood and other Islamists likely to lose elections for the national students’ union.
Elections for syndicates representing pharmacists and journalists have also been won either by independent candidates or by those openly hostile to the Islamist group, which controls the presidency and legislature.
Salafis, or puritan Muslims, who polled well in parliamentary elections that concluded in early 2012, are faring worse than the Brotherhood on many campuses.
The results reflect opinions polls showing support dropping for Mohamed Morsi, the former Brotherhood leader who became president last year. His approval ratings have dropped from nearly 80 per cent in September to less than 50 per cent this month in polls conducted by the Egyptian Center for Public Opinion Research.
The Brotherhood played down the latest losses, saying that it didn’t campaign hard in some elections or contest as many seats as last year to show that it was not trying to dominate the country’s political life.
“They succeeded in 50 per cent of the 50 per cent of seats they contested,” Dina Zakaria, spokesperson for the Brotherhood, said of the student union losses. “They didn’t compete in 100 per cent of the elections. They wanted others to bear responsibility with them. Now they have to share the responsibility of power.”
Brotherhood rivals say mistakes made on campuses cost the group popularity and votes. “They were in power last year, and people saw clearly how they talk but take zero action,” said Walid al Moghazy, a first-year law student and member of the 16-member student union leadership at Cairo University. The Brotherhood failed to win a single seat there this year.
The groups’s behaviour at the university – which included standing up in the middle of classes to make calls to prayer and pleading with men and women to segregate themselves on campus – annoyed many students. A call to ignore Valentine’s Day made the group especially unpopular.
Students at other universities pointed to similar antics. “Students felt they were trying to show off how religious they were,” said Mr Shaker.
Regardless of the reasons for the Brotherhood’s losses, they suggest a potentially novel political dynamic that could provide a fresh incentive for secular, liberal and leftist opposition groups to campaign fiercely in the upcoming parliamentary elections. Until now most of these groups have said they would boycott the poll because the Islamists have skewed the electoral rules in their favour.
After taking all but one of the seats for leadership of the pharmacists’ union last year, the Brotherhood won only two of 12 up for grabs in this year’s elections, giving them a slight, but much diminished majority. Winners of seats at the journalists’ syndicate also oppose the group, which has been seen as hostile to an increasingly boisterous media.
“This is a strong, clear, bright, decisive and perhaps even angry message that journalists sent to the ruling elites,” wrote Kareem Mahmoudin, a journalist who won a seat on the board, in a column for the leftist Al-Tahrir newspaper.
Turnout in many of the elections was low, reflecting the political malaise that has afflicted much of the country since the uprising two years ago that has failed so far to deliver on many of its promises. Only about 11,000 of 84,000 eligible voters cast ballots in the pharmacists’ syndicate elections. The journalists’ syndicate had to lower its quorum from 50 per cent to 25 per cent to elect a new leader.
Still, emotions occasionally ran high. Scuffles broke out between activists supporting and opposing the Brotherhood at Helwan University, south of Cairo, where the Islamists maintain a majority of seats but have lost five to their opponents since last year.
For its part, the Brotherhood acknowledges some losses but says it is satisfied with the results, even among students.
“One of the things that we’re criticised for is that we want to manipulate and dominate everything,” said Ms Zakaria. “This shows that the new system lets everyone operate. No one was banned. We prove that we give the opportunity to everyone to participate. We don’t want to exclude anyone from the scene.”
Financial Times
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