As chairman of the NDP's influential Policy Secretariat, Gamal Mubarak brought a package of political reform proposals that made him the center of attention at the conference. He was the main speaker at the general sessions, during which the NDP's platform was crystallized and its proposed reforms were unveiled and discussed. The conference reflected a shift from the more traditional attitudes of the party's old guard, which began when he first tilted the party's balance of power towards its younger members during the NDP's eighth congress in September 2002, and represented a major leap in Gamal Mubarak's political prestige.
On the first day of the conference, Mubarak made clear that "the NDP stands for moderation, openness and freedom, and fights extremism, isolation and coercion." NDP Secretary-General Safwat El-Sherif said the party firmly believes in free enterprise, a market economy, liberalization of trade and the reinforcement of the private sector's role in development. Mubarak, however, added: "The state will still be required to play the very limited role of protecting poor citizens and consumers from the vagaries of the market economy."
El-Sherif, described the party as being "populist", with the goal of ensuring that citizens' dreams come true. Mubarak insisted this could only occur when "the relationship between citizens and the state is based on a new social contract," affirming that the state must ensure that citizens benefit from political and socio-economic rights before it asks them to accept responsibilities for boosting development. This was why 'A New Way of Thinking and Rights of Citizens First' was chosen as the conference slogan.
President Hosni Mubarak wholeheartedly endorsed this agenda when addressing the conference on 28 September: "We firmly believe that citizens must get their rights first to ensure that they perform their obligations. Citizens must be full partners in the decision-making process."
Gamal Mubarak outlined these rights, opening up a wide dialogue on political reform and democratization within the ranks of civil society. He emphasized the principle of equal rights, with no discrimination on the basis of religion, sex or doctrine. To achieve this goal, he proposed to activate civil society associations, to amend much political legislation, particularly the 1956 Political Rights Law and the 1977 Political Parties Law, to upgrade the judicial system and to modernize Egypt's cultural infrastructure.
El-Sherif said another aspect of the party's new way of thinking involved its belief that the NDP need not monopolize the nation's politics. "We do not claim the NDP has ready-made solutions to the nation's difficult problems, but we claim it has a clear approach on how to address these problems."
Hussein Abdel-Razeq, chairman of the leftist Tagammu Party, told Al-Ahram Weekly: "It is good that after 25 years, the NDP has at last realized that it must not monopolize political life. We hope it will not take another 25 years to turn this tardy realization into reality." What surprised Abdel-Razeq was the fact that the party's old guard had so willingly accepted these ideas, which it had always adamantly opposed in the past. However, Gamal Mubarak led the debates about citizens' rights, in the presence of the ministers of Information, Parliamentary Affairs, Interior, and Justice, as well as the Speaker of the People's Assembly. He was also the key figure when it came to defining the party's relationship with the government.
Thanking Prime Minister Atef Ebeid for closely cooperating with the NDP over the past year, Mubarak said, "This has really helped us produce a package of effective policies." He added, however, that the government and the NDP should not provide rosy promises or adopt old-fashioned means of dealing with today's problems. "These problems require radical solutions rather than merely leaving them for future generations to deal with."
Ebeid thanked Gamal Mubarak "for his honest attempts to serve the nation, devoting hundreds of hours of his time to urge Egyptians to come up with an agenda on the nation's present and future challenges. His honesty and sincere efforts were the driving force behind all the reports presented to this conference."
Mahmoud Mohieddin, chairman of the conference's economic trends committee, said that the controversial decision to float the Egyptian pound was jointly agreed by to the government and the NDP, "but its implementation led to stringent criticism and deep suspicions". NDP insiders told Al-Ahram Weekly that there was a general feeling during the conference that the only way Ebeid's government would remain in office was by stabilizing the foreign exchange market. One of them said: "The government will be out of office if this market remains out of control."
In terms of the NDP's foreign policies, a report prepared by the policy secretariat emphasized that Egypt must "rationalize its relations with the Arab world. This means that Egypt's supreme interests are paramount and must be above any [other] considerations."
In contrast, the report stressed that Egypt must maintain a strategic relationship with America. "Both countries recognize that they are very important to each other." Addressing the American Chamber of Commerce on 22 September, Gamal Mubarak said Egyptian-American relations had reached an advanced stage of maturity. He had visited America twice this year, and claimed that the signature of a free trade agreement (FTA) between Egypt and the US is now closer than before. In his view this agreement favors both countries and the entire region.
Though the conference ended on 28 September with a vote of confidence for Prime Minister Atef Ebeid's government, NDP insiders and opposition figures alike told Al-Ahram Weekly that the survival of Ebeid's government would depend on the way it deals with rising prices and the dollar squeeze. The government's failure to check the seemingly endless rise in the prices of basic goods over the first half of 2003, they said, had negatively affected the ruling party's image. In this connection, the conference recommended to curb rising prices by cutting customs duties on imports of ready-made garments and basic foods (especially flour, maize, oils, sugar, tea, beans and lentils). "Egyptian families spend almost half their incomes on these basic goods. The reduction of tariffs on them will make their prices affordable for Egyptian families and thus relieve them of a major financial burden," the recommendation stated.
The conference also recommended that the government should play the central role in the import of goods from abroad. Some NDP insiders claimed that the private sector's growing involvement in this sphere had led to serious market imbalances. One of them said, "Some private sector businessmen managed to monopolize the import of basic goods (especially flour and sugar) and manipulate the market for their own personal gain."
Many saw no contradiction between encouraging the government to play a bigger role in importing strategic goods and the party's liberalization and privatization policies. "Privatization need not involve leaving the market and the lives of citizens to the mercy of a gang of unscrupulous private importers," one NDP insider said.
The demonstrations against the economic situation in September were clear signals that Ebeid and his cabinet needed to act fast. According to Economic Trends Committee Chairman Mahmoud Mohieddin, "the government will only be able to carry on with a solid base of popular support. The party is willing to help the government and see it move forward. President Mubarak said a market economy does not mean that the government should liquidate its social responsibilities. A strong government is a government capable of delivering a balance between liberalization and social responsibilities."
In response, Finance Minister Medhat Hassanein stressed the government's commitment to implement the recommendations of the conference. "All foodstuffs imported by the Commodities Authority will be exempted from custom duties. Custom duties on basic foods imported by the private sector will be reduced by 15 to 20 per cent," Hassanein said. He announced that the government also plans to submit to the People's Assembly a new bill amending the Unified Tax Law, which gives government and public sector employees [around 5.5 million people] new income tax exemptions.
Opposition leaders, however, warned that reducing customs duties on basic food imports and providing citizens with major income tax exemptions might not enable the government to cut the budget deficit, currently standing at around six per cent of GDP, and thus stimulate inflation.
Ebeid attributed the dramatic rise in prices more to an increase of 40% to 60% in global prices of food crops than to the devaluation of the Egyptian pound. The Prime Minister said his government is committed to cushioning limited-income citizens against sudden and abrupt price rises. "This is not a setback for liberalization, but an inevitable manifestation of the government's social obligations." But Ebeid admitted that stabilizing food prices also required stabilizing the foreign exchange market and said that the federation of banks, the Central Bank of Egypt and the government must work with him towards this goal. The government would cooperate with banks to meet importers' foreign exchange needs. "Banks now have good databases on exporters, which they will use to ensure that three quarters of their [foreign currency] receipts go to banks. This is essential for guaranteeing that foreign exchange is readily available all the time."
Ebeid also said that banks would introduce new deposits featuring higher interest rates on the Egyptian pound, in order to discourage citizens from hoarding dollars. He expressed hope that recent gains in both tourism and commodity exports would help to secure a balance of payments surplus.
NDP insiders agreed with opposition figures that the ultimate panacea for the dollar squeeze is boosting exports, attracting a greater volume of overseas investments and reducing imports. But El-Hariri said that this will not happen unless there is a complete change in the country's politico-economic structures.
