At the National Democratic Party’s annual congress and in the meetings that followed, Gamal Mubarak worked hard to portray himself as one of the people – extending a hand to the poor and needy, trumping up the “golden age of the peasant,” and asserting that small farmers are in the heart and mind of the ruling party.
“I try to stand in the shoes of the farmer in order to know why he loses money, while a merchant doesn’t,” said Mubarak, who is the son of President Hosni Mubarak and the chairman of the party’s Policies Committee, during a meeting on food security at the NDP’s three-day convention, which lasted from 30 October to 2 November. Mubarak talked about setting fixed prices for wheat and rice, primary crops that peasants have been selling at half price. He also discussed easing farmers’ financial debts.
Not everybody, however, is convinced that Mubarak is as pro-farmer as he says. “It’s mere statements so far. There are no real programs and the peasants are not exactly the main concern of Gamal Mubarak and his party,” said Karam Saber, founder of the Land Center, an organization advocating for farmers’ rights. “Some farmers may indeed fall for it and believe that he is the savior,” Saber said. But for most it will be a hard sell.
The NDP maintains that Mubarak’s policies targeting farmers are "rational, well-thought, and address existing issues in a very pragmatic way," according to Rachid Mohammed Rachid, Minister of Trade and Industry. "To disregard the contents of the policies and to say that it’s all staged doesn’t make sense. We need to have rational and real discussions before jumping to conclusions," Rachid said in a phone interview with Al-Masry Al-Youm English Edition.
Mubarak has tried to reach out to the common man before, but this is the first time he has associated himself with the agriculture and its disadvantaged workers, who are said to account for up to 50 per cent of the population. This year, the fellah, or peasant, was center stage during the conference and the parliamentary councils held in its wake.
“I know, Gamal Bek,”– meaning Master—“that you’re partial towards the peasants, which is why they’re here today in great numbers,” said Abdel Rahim el-Goul, a prominent NDP member of parliament and the head of the Agricultural Committee.
Mubarak graduated from the American University in Cairo where he studied Business Administration. His first job was as an investment banker with the Bank of America in Egypt, followed by a stint in London. He is often criticized as being cut off from the Egyptian population. The criticism became especially harsh after he became a prominent figure in his father’s party, and following speculation that the party is preparing him to take power from his 81-year-old father who has ruled Egypt for 28 years.
Speculation over his succession grew after the 2007 amendment of Article 76 of the constitution, which included the condition that any presidential contender must have a total of 250 endorsements from the People’s Assembly and the Shura Council, something more or less only the NDP can secure.
This was believed to put hurdles for smaller parties and independents to run, and seal the deal for Gamal Mubarak to be able to contest the 2011 elections. Mubarak never admitted that he sought the presidency, although he hasn’t truly denied it in the past few years. And this year he evaded all related questions, which seemed to fuel the belief that the party is only waiting for the right moment to drop the bomb and announce him as the NDP presidential candidate.
His opponents criticized his lack of military background – a president in Egypt is given the ceremonial position of the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces . They also said that the fact that he never used public transportation, never haggled prices, or scrambled to make ends meet made him unrepresentative of the vast majority of the population.
Mubarak was also lampooned for surrounding himself with a circle of glitzy businessmen like steel mogul and MP Ahmed Ezz and Ahmed el-Maghrabi, Minister of Housing, Utilities and Urban Communities, and for bolstering ties with Washington through several unannounced visits. This year he was named one of Time Magazine’s top 100 people who shape the world.
The president’s son is heavily guarded–figuratively and literally–and has always seemed inapproachable. Even in his public speeches he rarely smiled and never delivered impromptu. His gestures were stiff and his tone businesslike. In many ways, Mubarak still seemed like a businessman.
"Gamal Mubarak himself, with all due respect, may be a successful expert on banks and business management but he does have any political talent or experience of any kind," wrote celebrated novelist and government critic Alaa el-Aswany in an editorial this November.
But at this year’s NDP conference, Mubarak appeared more relaxed, at times even gracious. He referred to the peasants as “his people” and he responded to questions and remarks from the floor.
Mubarak seemed to take up the gauntlet that the opposition has thrown to him, admitting that there are “painful” problems that need to be solved, especially among farmers and the poorer sectors of the Egyptian populace, problems that he said he has personally witnessed during recent tours of villages and small towns, and informal chats with farmers. Opposition forces, however, say that this new tack is just NDP politicking.
The plans for the villages and the fellah are real, Mubarak assured.
The tours, that he referred to several times during his public speeches and which made headlines in newspapers and government mouthpieces, are part of an NDP-sponsored reform project targeting Egypt’s poorest one thousand villages. The party says they are taking this project seriously, while the opposition brushes it off as a “facelift,” to both the villages and Mubarak.
Mubarak has vowed to make poverty and agricultural reforms two of his signature issues, beside open-market business ventures, economic reform, foreign investment, employment, youth development, education, and health care.
It’s a long list but it’s no secret that the party’s number two refuses to play second fiddle in any of the major fields. Analysts say that this is another NDP attempt to boost his popularity and groom him for the top job.
“It’s a well-planned strategy by the policies committee, those around him, and the party’s PR experts. They want Gamal Mubarak to appear as an overarching leader not just as someone who’s interested in technical economic policies, but as a heavyweight politician,” said Nabil Abdel Fatah, political analyst at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies.
These tactics are new to the Egyptian politics. “They emulate European and American traditions that focus on revamping the image of a leader by using the media revolution and other ploys to influence the public,” said Abdel Fatah.
"Dozens of meetings and seminars have been held at which Gamal Mubarak has made speeches hailed by hypocritical members of the National Democratic Party and government writers, and Mr Gamal Mubarak has been to villages and poor neighborhoods on numerous visits where some wretched people are chosen by security to have their pictures taken as they clap and cheer for Gamal Mubarak," wrote el-Aswani. "None of these campaigns have convinced Egyptians that succession is a good idea. On the contrary, they have made Egyptians reject, condemn and sometimes joke about the succession."
Rachid, who is a close ally of Mubarak, denied that this is the case, saying that it’s not a maneuver. "The policies committee has been involved in agricultural reforms for many years … It’s not something that came out of the blue. This is a consistent policy of the party. What’s different this year? It has been problematic because of the [global] economic crisis and that’s why the farmers [agenda] was clearly highlighted, and not because of underlying political reasons."
Still, those working closely with the farmers maintain that it’s cosmetic, insisting that it is not going to be easy for the party to reinvent Mubarak’s image as the man of the people. “Gamal Mubarak’s promises come when the peasant is at low ebb and ready to believe anything,” said Saber, of The Land Center, warning that the “empty talk” of the NDP will not hold up if action does not follow.
On the ground nothing has been done so far, said Beshir Saqr, a veteran activist and expert in agrarian issues, who believed that the initiatives the NDP have been spearheading in the past few years, especially those which carried the name of Gamal Muabark, "were in reality schemes to put the industry in the hands of big multinational companies and big farmers."
"The prices of everything, insecticides, animal foods, agricultural machinery, fuel, and rent have tripled and quadrupled. Benefits on monetary loans given to farmers have increased from four per cent in the 1990s to 20 per cent now. Many farmers are abandoning their lands or selling them; it’s become too expensive to maintain. And this is what the NDP wants. They want the small farmer to step aside. The land is now bought by big wealthy farmers and members of parliament, people who can work grand farms and in turn create a market for multinational agricultural production companies," Saqr said.
Saber largely agrees. “The initiative that Gamal Mubarak launched in 2009 for easing the pains of the peasant is unclear," he said. "The party has kept the particulars of it a secret it seems.”
Indeed, the NDP is promising big funds for their “village” plans but the details are inscrutable and the implementation remains unclear to the average fellah.
“When we go back home, what shall we say to our people?” a farmer and an NDP member asked Mubarak at the conference. The question is significant, according to observers, because it comes after reports of months-long deliberations by the NDP on agricultural issues and much lip service to farmers by Mubarak. “Farmers don’t have problems anymore, because they simply stopped farming," said another critic.
Some commentators in opposition newspapers argued that if the farmers don’t understand the NDP’s agriculture plans it is impossible for independent observers who are cut off from the day-to-day challenges of peasants and farmers to understand.
“These are big questions, and tours are not enough to solve or even propose solutions to such complicated problems that include irrigation, debts, poverty, and bridging the gaps between classes,” Abdel Fatah said.
"From a technical point of view, Gamal Mubarak doesn’t know anything about the farmers’ problems and he probably never saw farmers in his life," said a cynical Saqr. But the pro-farmers campaign is not about practical solutions. “This is all to prepare Gamal Mubarak to be the next president," he added.
