(Photo from Al-Dostour Party)
One of Egypt’s most prominent post-revolution parties, Al-Dostour, is days away from electing new leadership to succeed its current leader, Hala Shukrallah.
The committee overseeing the party’s general elections has set them for 26 June, and will see voting for the election of the chairman, the secretary general, and a trustee.
The committee is currently reviewing the logs of eligible voters before the nomination door closes for candidates on Thursday.
“The deadline for candidates’ application is 18 June,” party spokesperson Khaled Dawoud told Daily News Egypt, but no names of nominees were announced.
The party was founded by the now Vienna-based politician and former vice president Mohamed El-Baradei in April 2012. He led the party until August 2013, when he resigned, leaving the party to be led by co-founder Sayed Qassem. Shukrallah was elected president in February 2014, becoming the first Coptic woman to be elected to lead a political party in Egypt.
“There are no names officially announced to run the upcoming elections yet,” press officer of the party, Samah El-Ghazawy, told Daily News Egypt.
However, she said that only one campaign, entitled “Together We Can”, has announced it is going to prepare a list of candidates to run in the elections. The campaign is known to be affiliated to politician and leading party member Gameela Ismail, who is expected to be the campaign’s candidate to party presidency.
Other names are expected to announce their bid for the presidency, but whilst unconfirmed, the names include former minister of manpower Ahmed Al-Boraei and the party’s current secretary general Tamer Goma’a.
Elections are also expected in the upcoming weeks to be seen in another vocal secular post-revolution party, the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, but a definite date has not yet been set.
