The newly formed Salafi Al-Watan Party met with representatives of other parties on Tuesday to discuss the upcoming elections.
Al-Watan Party representatives first met with representatives of Al-Wasat Party, which describes itself as using Islamic culture as its reference. Yousry Hammad, the vice chairman of Al-Watan Party said the meeting discussed the latest political developments and the upcoming election and election law. There were also talks of coalitions.
The spokesperson of Al-Wasat Party Amr Farouk said, “the meetings were just traditional meetings… Al-Watan Party is new and just wants people to know of it.” He added there were no final talks about a coalition.
Al-Watan Party representatives have also met with representatives of the Building and Development Party. During these meeting, the criteria of coalitions and their benefits in the upcoming elections were discussed, Hammad said.
A founder of the Building and Development Party Tarek Al-Zommor confirmed the meeting was about the nature of the upcoming election. “There were talks about the idea of uniting some of the parties that defend the revolution,” he said. He added that no coalition had been officially formed during the meeting.
Al-Watan Party, headed by Emad Abdel-Gahfour, was launched at a press conference last week. It is cofounded by Emad Abdel-Ghafour, the former chairman of Al-Nour Party. Similarly, Hammad was the spokesperson of Al-Nour Party. Many other members of the Salafi Al-Nour Party have left the party to form the newly founded Al-Watan.
The two parties have agreed to form a committee to resolve the issues between them including financial issues and deciding on which party retains their headquarters and official websites.
“I would like to tell everyone who talks about these issues that these issues will be solved by the heads of the parties, who harbour love and respect for each other,” Hammad said.
Last week, Ahmed Mawlana, the spokesperson of Al-Shaab party said his party will join forces with Al-Fadeela Party and the party being formed by Hazem Salah Abu Ismail to form one party. He added that the new party along with other Islamist parties will form a coalition with Al-Watan Party.
