Muslim Brotherhood leaders have started a new round of negotiations with former presidential candidates’ campaigns in effort to persuade them to support Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsy in the upcoming runoff vote.
Leaders from the group and its political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, hope to meet with former Brotherhood member Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh, Nasserist Hamdeen Sabbahi and revolutionary groups.
A source close to the ongoing negotiations told Al-Masry Al-Youm Wednesday that they started under instructions from the Brotherhood Guidance Bureau, and that a new set of guarantees would be proposed to political powers, including ideas for local council elections.
Authorities said in February that local council elections nationwide would be conducted in July or August at the latest, after a new president is elected.
The transitional government decided to dissolve those councils, which were controlled by the disbanded National Democratic Party in conformance with a ruling issued in June 2011.
The same source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Abouel Fotouh and Sabbahi campaigns have said they would only participate in negotiations if national powers and parties that support their candidates and oppose Morsy are invited.
Nagy Naguib, a senior FJP member in Sharqiya, said the party met with all other parties and political powers in the governorate Monday to negotiate ways to support Morsy’s candidacy and prevent the return of Mubarak-era officials.
Naguib told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the Democratic Front and April 6 Youth Movement as well as the Free Egyptians, Nour, Construction and Development, Arab Nasserist, Tagammu and Egyptian Social Democratic parties attended the meeting. Revolutionary coalitions also attended.
Naguib said the political powers demand guarantees that would include limiting Morsy’s presidency to one term, choosing Morsy’s deputies from outside the Brotherhood and from revolutionary groups, and having a unified list of candidates in the local council elections.
Mohamed Abdallah Sayyaf, who is in charge of the Brotherhood administrative office in Beni Suef, said members from the party’s secretariat in the governorate met with leaders from the Jihad and Salafi movements.
Sayyaf told Al-Masry Al-Youm that FJP is coordinating with all political powers in the governorate to back Morsy.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
