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April 18th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda The comment comes as the country’s presidential election, due on May 23 and 24, draws near, while a run-off will be held from June 16 to 17, if necessary.
Press TV has conducted an interview with former Egyptian Deputy FM, Hussein Haridy to further discuss the issue.
The video also offers the opinions of two other guests: London-based writer and journalist, Adel Lotfy and director of the Center for Middle East Studies Hisham Jaber from Beirut.
What follows is a rough transcript of the interview.
Press TV: Mr. Haridy the election commission in Egypt has said that the ten candidates were knocked out of the race on legal grounds. Now first of all, do you agree with these legal grounds that have been put forward by election commission authorities?
Haridy: Yes, madam, I guess I have to salute the presidential election commission in Egypt. It has shown courage and the decision taken today has eased the way for a more sober presidential campaign.
Three out of the ten would be presidential candidates, if they had been allowed to take part in the presidential elections would have caused a lot of political tension within Egyptian society and among Egyptian political forces, but I have to underline the fact that the presidential commission when taking its decision on disbarring them from entering the presidential race did that on strictly legal grounds.
Press TV: Well, Mr. Haridy before I return to other guests now I just like to put to you again the question of the qualification of the judges who are making this decision in the election commission. That has been the issue that has been raised by opponents of this decision.
They have been saying, while these people belong to Hosni Mubarak’s regime, are they qualified to make this decision about the election process that is upcoming?
Haridy: Well, Madam this argument of high Egyptian officials belonging to the Mubarak era is a false argument. These are judges, the president of the presidential commission. If the president of the Constitutional Court of Egypt and his deputy is among the highest sitting judges on the State Council and in the Court of Appeals.
So and these judges have very good reputation from a legal point of view and I guess I do not share this argument of opposing them solely because they were appointed by the former president of Egypt.
I guess all of them have been working for the State of Egypt and not for any single president per se.
Press TV: Mr. Haridy one issue that is also causing a lot of concern is the insistences we are hearing coming from the Military Council. The pressure that is putting for the constitution they say to be written and to be approved in a referendum, preferably they say before the elections are held.
Now some people are for this move and some people are against it. Some are saying, well one month is not enough for this whole constitutional process to take place.
On the other hand, if it doesn’t take place what does this show? Does this show that the Military Council is trying to maintain its power? What is your view on this?
Haridy: Well, I believe the military when they say that they want to hand over the authority to an elected civilian president.
As a matter of fact before the parliamentary elections last October until last January, the Military Council promised to hand over legislative powers to a newly elected parliament and the military did that on January 23rd, 2012 and I sincerely believe that the military would like to go back to the barracks on June 30th.
As far as the writing of the new constitution is concerned, I do not think this is a very serious issue. We, Egypt, has a long constitutional history and drafting a new constitution should not take much time.
Having said that we have to take into account the fact that most political forces and political parties in Egypt have agreed on the most salient articles in this constitution.
One issue remains to be clarified is the following, whether the Egyptian system will be a parliamentary system, a presidential system or a mixed system? Or a mixed parliamentary-presidential?
I believe that the consensus or the near consensus among the political forces in this country is that for the foreseeable future, Egypt needs a mixed system that is to say partly parliamentary and partly presidential.
In this context they will have to discuss the responsibilities of the new head of state and I think that there is also a consensus of that.
Supposing that for one reason or another, the Constituent Assembly or the Constituent Commission would not be able to finish drafting the new constitution before June 30th.
Then I believe that there will not be a constitutional void in Egypt inasmuch as we have a constitutional declaration and I guess once we have a new head of state and power will be transferred from the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces [SCAF] to this gentleman and I guess he could exercise his powers according to the constitutional declaration till we have a new constitution.
Press TV: Mr. Haridy would you say that the Muslim Brotherhood, we know that the Muslim Brotherhood took part in the elections and people voted for the MPs to go into parliament, that is the argument that they themselves are putting forward, however should this be viewed as a threat as the media, in some media, at least are portraying it?
Haridy: Well, it depends on where you stand on the issue. Definitely the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood ever since their establishment back in 1928 has been antidemocratic.
But what happened in Egypt after the downfall of former President Mubarak is that people did not find any organized political force in front of them, so the people trusted the Muslim Brotherhood.
But I guess there is, I can assure you today madam, that there is a growing disappointment and disenchantment among the majority of Egyptians as far as the Muslim Brotherhood is concerned.
I guess the future of Egyptian democracy lies in the fact that all political forces should strive for the middle ground for political compromises for the sake of establishing a well-functioning Egyptian democracy and Egypt does not belong to a single party or to a single organization or to a single ideology.
Let me bring up the army once again madam. The Egyptian army whether after 1952 or prior to 1952 has always been an integral part of the Egyptian Nationalist Movement and it will remain a very strong party in Egyptian society.
Most Egyptians have always had a deep respect for the military in Egypt. The military in Egypt belongs to all people of Egypt.
I for one- I spent four years of my life among the Egyptian military, so you won’t find anyone in Egypt who would be accusing the military or who would be attacking the military.
MY/VG/GHN
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