Social Democratic Party leader resigns in tense pre-elections climate

Declaring he could no longer “work in these conditions,” the head of the Egyptian Social Democratic Party resigned on Thursday, the latest of several party leaders to recently step down as internal disputes intensify ahead of the parliamentary elections.

“My idea of a party that follows a social democratic ideology, a great party, a popular party that can self-finance itself reasonably, has become impossible to achieve in light of intense differences,” ex-party chief Mohamed Abul Ghar said in a statement published on the privately owned Bawaba website.

Though he tried to work with the leadership to eliminate “cronyism” and alleviate the party’s financial struggles, Abul Ghar continued, he was unable to push those reforms through.

Abul Ghar apologized to those whom he had promised to support in the upcoming elections, while thanking “all members of the party in the provinces who participated in and continue to work for the party and to aid Egypt during complex and difficult circumstances.” 

Tamer al-Meyhy, a former leading member who left the party five months ago, thinks that the problem lies in the group's very foundations. He explained to Mada Masr that the party was formed to combat religious political movements, but that need no longer exists.

The Egyptian Social Democratic Party was founded in March 2011, shortly before the Muslim Brotherhood began to assume a political power that crescendoed with the June 2012 election of prominent Brotherhood figure Mohamed Morsi to a short-lived presidency. 

“The Egyptian Social Democratic Party is continuing on a path that is no longer viable in today’s politics,” Meyhy said. “The party was established to stand against a religious state, against the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood. That situation no longer exists.”

Abul Ghar’s resignation comes just one day after the Watan Party’s vice chair, Yahia Qadry, also stepped down from his post.

Qadry said he resigned after enduring “many attacks from the Egyptian Front. I thank them for that, and wish them success,” the privately owned Youm7 newspaper reported.

The Egyptian Front — one of the largest party coalitions in the country — had been in talks with Watan about a potential merger. 

Dostour Party head Hala Shukrallah also left her position earlier this month after a series of conflicts within the party. Several members had been angered by Dostour’s decision to boycott the parliamentary elections, a decision that was made under Shukrallah’s leadership.

Abul Ghar was publically critical of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi prior to the recent announcement of dates for the elections, which were postponed several times in violation of the Constitution. He accused Sisi of not wanting a parliament at all, and lambasted him for issuing hundreds of laws in the absence of an elected legislative body.

“That’s why the call for parliamentary elections came so late, and that’s why the state issued so many laws in the absence of parliament. A lot of these laws are unconstitutional. Some restrict Egypt’s civil freedoms and turn it into a police state, while other laws were issued even though they were not urgently needed,” the former party leader said.

After a delay of over a year, the parliamentary elections are now scheduled to take place in three phases between September and December. Hopeful candidates began registering for the election three days ago, a process that opened with clashes between overeager contenders vying to be the first to register.