Egyptian military ready for power transfer

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Published time: May 03, 2012 11:54
Edited time: May 04, 2012 06:43

The Egyptian army could pass executive power to the future president at the end of May, should one of the candidates run away with the election. The statement was made by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces of Egypt (SCAF).

­“We intend to transfer power on May 24 in case any of the candidates wins in the first round,” the country’s chief-of-staff and deputy head of SCAF Sami Anan told to the leaders of Egyptian political parties on Thursday.

According to Anan, if no one wins the first tour, the transfer of power will be made later on the results of the second round, but in any case before June 30.

The consultations with leaders of Egypt’s political parties have been called to ease recently-sparked tensions between the government and the parliament.

The Islamist parliamentary majority boycotted the meeting with Sami Anan in protest against clashes in Abbassiya quarter of Cairo on Wednesday that left nine people dead and over 100 injured. The massacre happened when unknown hit men attacked a tent camp of opposition rallying for the soonest transfer of power from military to civil authorities.

Sami Anan has expressed sorrow for Wednesday, stressing that only the interference of army stopped the clashes.

But researcher Suhair Riad from the Cairo Center for Human Rights believes that the ruling military is directly responsible for these deaths. “Police did not intervene for four days of clashes,” she told RT. “The last clash, which was the most violent, happened for 10 hours right in front of the Ministry of Defense, with military police standing a few feet away from protesters and no-one intervened until 20 people were killed and hundreds were injured.”

Last Sunday, the Egyptian parliament chose to suspend all activities for one week in protest against the further function of the government of Kamal al-Ganzuri, the newly appointed Egyptian prime minister.

The speaker of the lower chamber of parliament, Saad El-Katatny, and his fellow Islamist deputies called on to the government of PM al-Ganzuri to resign before Sunday. The deputies said the new government is unable to fulfill expectations of the people of Egypt and that its actions “contradict legislative norms.”

If the prime minister refuses to resign, deputies proposed that the head of SCAF and the highest authority in the country Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi should dismiss the government. In any event, the resignation never took place.