The head of Egypt’s ruling military council on Sunday called for Parliament members to meet with the People’s Assembly speaker to select members of the constituent assembly that will write the new constitution.
Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi set the meeting for 3 March at 11 am, and the decision will be published in the official Egyptian Gazette, which publishes new laws.
The Constitutional Declaration ratified last March stipulated that Parliament will select a 100-member committee to draft the new constitution. Tantawi said that only the elected members of the parliament, not the members appointed by the military council, will be meeting with the People’s Assembly Speaker Saad al-Katatny to select constituent members.
Essam al-Erian, deputy chief of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party and head of Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, said in statements published by state-owned Al-Ahram newspaper that the party is holding bilateral talks with all political forces about the formation of the assembly.
Erian said his party proposes that the 100-member committee include 40 members from the upper and lower houses of Parliament, 30 public figures whom the two houses agree on and 30 other members from other categories, such as the syndicates, authorities, unions, Al-Azhar and the Coptic Church.
He said he will call on all the different bodies to choose their representatives so the People’s Assembly and Shura Council members can select the required number of members.
Liberals and secularists fear control by Islamists on the constitution writing process after the parties dominated the parliamentary elections.
Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohamed Badie said last week that the people will choose their own constitution; it will not be imposed on them.
