The sacking order against Kareem el-Beheiri, Ghazl el-Mahalla worker and blogger, was revoked.
Category: Blog
NDP favors patronage over politics
From AFP:
Despite a highly marketed effort at modernization, Egypt’s ruling party is still centered on one man and draws much of its loyalty from its function as a patronage machine, analysts say.
A stylish image revamp and the emergence of a reform-minded camp in the last five years have done little more than add gloss to the National Democratic Party whose founding members still call the shots.
“At the leadership level there really isn’t much of an internal debate,” Issandr El Amrani, an analyst with the International Crisis Group, told AFP.
During its ninth general congress which wrapped up on Tuesday, 5,310 members elected President Hosni Mubarak chairman of the party in an uncontested vote that was cast and counted in less than two hours. Party Secretary General Safwat Al-Sherif was re-elected to his post at Mubarak’s suggestion.
The party has maintained its pyramid structure since its establishment in 1978. The NDP, a re-incarnation of the Arab Socialist Union, the ruling state party created by President Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1962, has never strayed too far from the one-party model, Amrani said.
“It isn’t as old-fashioned as the ASU but provides the same services, it’s a patronage machine,” Amrani said.
Three police officers indicted in Qalubiya torture case
From the Daily News…
A man in Qalubyia is accusing three police officers of torturing and sodomizing him in June of last year.
This comes only a week after two police officers were sentenced to three-year prison terms for torturing and sodomizing microbus driver Emad Al-Kabir.
Police officers Mohammed Ashour, Sherif Abdel Salam and Ahmad Sayed from the Cairo suburb of Al-Qanater Khaireya, were reportedly indicted on Sunday on charges of “resorting to violence.” The case is to be heard this week.
The victim, 27-year-old Ahmad Sayed Hassanein, claims that he was arrested by Lieutenant Muhammad Ashour on June 1, 2006 on charges of drug possession and subsequently transferred to the police station where officers Sherif Abdel-Salam and Ahmad Sayed Abul-Fotouh allegedly tortured and sexually assaulted him with a stick.
When Hassanein shortly thereafter appeared in court to face accusations of drug trafficking, he accused the police officers of torturing and sodomizing him.
A coroner’s report confirmed signs of torture and sexual abuse on the victim’s body, according to the Associated Press.
In another twist in the case, a relative of Hassanein alleged that a group of police officers paid a visit to Hassanein’s family home hoping to reach a bargain.
If Hassanein dropped the torture charges, the charges of drug possession against him would be waived, the officers allegedly offered. But the family declined, according to a report by Al-Masry Al-Youm.