By AFP
CAIRO: The Egyptian government on Sunday confirmed a court order to dissolve local councils for being dominated by officials close to the regime of former president Hosni Mubarak, state media reported.
“The government has decided to endorse the court’s ruling to dissolve the municipal councils,” a caption broadcast on state television said.
Cairo’s Supreme Administrative Court ruled on June 28 to disband these councils, whose term expires in 2012, following complaints that they were controlled by Mubarak’s now-dissolved National Democratic Party (NDP).
At the last municipal elections in 2008, the NDP took almost 92 percent of the vote on a tiny turnout.
The councils were central to the network by which the Egyptian government wielded influence and dispensed patronage across the country.
Their dissolution was among the demands of the widespread protests that pushed Mubarak to resign on February 11.
No date has yet been proposed for new municipal elections.
Both chambers of parliament were also dissolved in the wake of Mubarak’s transferring power to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which has vowed to pave the way for a free democratic society.
It has scheduled parliamentary elections for September, followed by the drafting of a constitution and then presidential elections.
