Constitution ratified in Egypt
The charter’s adoption signifies a victory for President Mohammed Morsi.
CAIRO — Egypt announced the ratification of a new Islamist-backed constitution Tuesday, a move that many in the country hope will end weeks of bitter political turmoil.
The country’s high electoral commission declared the charter’s official approval at a news conference Tuesday night in Cairo. Nearly 64 percent of the 17 million Egyptians who voted in a national referendum this month approved the document.
The new constitution officially replaces the country’s 1971 charter, which was written under the military regime of Anwar Sadat and remained in place until the aftermath of the popular uprising t hat ousted Sadat’s successor, Hosni Mubarak, in February 2011.
The charter’s adoption signifies a victory for Egypt’s elected president, Mohammed Morsi, and his Islamist backers, after months of political conflict in which the Islamists squared off against a broad but disparate opposition composed of liberals, secularists and old regime loyalists. Protests from both sides, regarding the balance of power in the new Egypt and the religious character of its guiding charter, occasionally devolved into violence.
Critics of the new charter say it will deepen the influence of Islamic law while failing to protect the rights of women and minority groups.
Morsi says the text offers enough protection for minorities, and adopting it quickly is necessary to end two years of turmoil and political uncertainty that has ravaged the economy.
“I hope all national powers will now start working together now to build a new Egypt,” said Murad Ali, a senior official in the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party.
Opposition leaders, who mounted a last-minute campaign for a “no” vote in the referendum, which concluded Saturday, said during the weekend that their effort to defeat the document had still yielded some positive points.
The opposition accused Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood of carrying out mass fraud in the two- phase vote, but leaders said that the high number of “no” votes, about 36 percent, signifies an important show of force as the country hurtles toward a new round of elections in two months.
Under the new charter, the government must hold elections for the lower house of Parliament within 60 days.
It is a contest that the opposition said it is likely to challenge, while continuing its push to annul the new constitution.
“We can say that we are diversifying our options, using all possible means to say that Egypt is not up for this kind of extortion,” said Hussein Abdelghani, a spokesman for the opposition’s main alliance, the National Salvation Front.
Regardless of the constitution’s approval, Abdelghani said that politics in Egypt would be different in the months ahead.
“Now there is a balance in political life. This is what changed in the last month and a half,” he said. “The (opposition) now has a title, and there is a force now to contend with the Islamists.”