Archive for Abdel Ghafour

Former Nour Party head establishes new party, alliance with Abu Ismail

by admin
January 1st, 2013

Former Nour Party head Emad Abdel Ghafour has announced the formation of the Al-Watan Party, as well as a new alliance with former presidential candidate Hazem Salah Abu Ismail.

In a conference Tuesday at the Al-Azhar Conference Center, Abdel Ghafour said the new party will be open to all Salafis and seeks Sharia implementation through actions and not only slogans. He added that the party will contest upcoming parliamentary elections.

Abdel Ghafour had earlier resigned as leader of the Salafi-oriented Nour Party.

Youssry Hammad, the vice president of the new party, said that it will include both youth and more experienced members in its quest to protect Sharia, which is considers a popular demand.

He added that the party has a plan for national projects that will improve the economy, restore the middle class and address the needs of persons with disabilities.

Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm

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New Salafi party to be announced Tuesday

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December 29th, 2012

Former spokesperson of Salafi-oriented Nour Party Yousry Hammad revealed that the establishment of the new Watan party will be announced on Tuesday at al-Azhar University.

In a note posted on his Facebook page on Saturday, Hammad wrote that at the third meeting of the party's founders it was agreed that Emad Abdel Ghafoor would represent them.

The contact details of those responsible for collecting signatures in different governorates to establish the party will be announced shortly.

Emad Abdel Ghafour, Nour Party head and Assistant to the President, announced his resignation from the party this morning, saying that he is now “in the process of establishing and founding Watan Party.”

Abdel Ghafour described it as “the biggest party combining all spectrums of Islamic and national forces in Egypt.”

About 150 leading members of the Nour Party, representing 23 governorates, have submitted their resignation from the party over the past week.

Hammad said the reason Abdel Ghafour resigned from the Nour Party was “the interventions of some members of the Salafi Front in party affairs.”

He revealed that a number of the party’s founders have been meeting with other Salafi figures to discuss with them the aim of creating the Watan Party.

The new party, Hammad said, is open to all those who will sincerely contribute to the building of this country.

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Nour Party leader to resign Tuesday, forms alliance with Abu Ismail

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December 24th, 2012

A leading figure in the Salafi Dawah group said Monday that Emad Abdel Ghafour, head of the Salafi Nour Party, and the Salafi preacher Hazem Salah Abu Ismail agreed to form a new political alliance.

Sources from the party told Al-Masry Al-Youm Sunday that Abdel Ghafour, spokespeople Yousry Hammad and Mohamed Nour and other party leaders plan to resign Tuesday.

Hisham Abul Nasr, head of the Salafi Dawah branch in Giza, told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the new alliance will be named “Al-Watan,” and will be headed by Abu Ismail with Abdel Ghafour as his first deputy.

Abdel Ghafour and 95 percent of the party youths in greater Cairo are resigning on Tuesday to join the new party, Abul Nasr added.

He said the new alliance is negotiating with all Islamist parties and forces to join and face liberal parties in the upcoming parliamentary elections.

Ayman Elias of Abu Ismail’s campaign said the new party is not responsible for any divisions within the Nour Party. “They were already divided,” he said.

Nour Party Vice President Sayed Mostafa said no member of the party’s supreme committee expressed his wish to replace Abdel Ghafour.

Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
 

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Nour Party crisis ends, Abdel Ghafour president until Thursday

by admin
October 6th, 2012

 

The supreme body of the Salafi-oriented Nour Party has decided to reappoint Emad Abdel Ghafour as party president until Thursday, when a new president and supreme body are elected.

The board of trustees had met with all sides in the party’s ongoing dispute, including Abdel Ghafour’s supporters and the supreme body, and was able bring the two sides towards a reconciliation. The supreme body released a statement late Friday renewing confidence in Abdel Ghafour and announcing that the party’s problems had been solved.

The supreme body of the Nour Party had announced on 26 September the dismissal of Emad Abdel Ghafour from his post as the party’s head. But a faction supporting Abdel Ghafour insisted that he was still president, as party rules do not allow the dismissal of the party's head unless through a general assembly meeting.

The crisis roots back to a dispute over the internal elections of the party, which led Abdel Ghafour to cancel them. The central election committee, however, decided to go on with the elections according to the supreme body’s instructions. 

Mostafa Khalifa, who was named president following Abdel Ghafour’s dismissal, will temporarily relinquish his post until the meeting holds its general assembly meeting. 

According to a statement issued by Nour Party spokesperson Nader Bakkar through Twitter, all parties agreed to go on with the party's internal elections according to the previously set schedule. It was also agreed that the wise men committee will consider all complaints submitted concerning the elections.

Bakkar added that he still does his job, set by the party’s supreme body, as spokesperson of the Nour party. The other spokespeople from the party are Yosri Hammad and Mohamed Nour; Bakkar had briefly been sacked from the position during the crisis.

The resolution comes before a scheduled meeting of the affairs committee on the disputeIt should be noted that the Nour Party crisis has ended just hours before the meeting of the Political Parties Affairs Committee to decide whether the party would be frozen.

Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm

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Salafi Dawah supports no confidence decision against Nour Party chief

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September 30th, 2012

The Salafi Dawah board expressed support Saturday for the supreme authority of the Salafi Nour Party's decision to withdraw confidence in embattled party president Emad Abdel Ghafour.

In a statement published on the Nour Party’s website, the Salafi Dawah board thanked Abdel Ghafour for his efforts and for cooperating with the Dawah board during his presidency of the party.

The party also congratulated Mostafa Khalifa, whom had originally been named to succeed Abdel Ghafour.

An internal crisis erupted inside the Nour Party, the biggest Salafi party in Egypt, after Abdel Ghafour insisted on postponing elections for the party’s offices in the governorates until after the membership committee was reformed. The party’s supreme authority, meanwhile, insisted on conducting the elections and decided to withdraw confidence in Abdel Ghafour.

Following the move, Abdel Ghafour formed his own supreme authority, which decided to stop the elections and renewed confidence in him on Thursday. Members of the rival supreme authority also referred party members responsible for the no-confidence motion for investigations.

On its website, the party said Sunday that it hopes the elections will produce competent officials who will be able uphold the party’s political vision.

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Nour Party renews confidence in its president

by admin
September 27th, 2012

The new supreme body of the Salafi Nour Party on Thursday renewed confidence in the party’s president, Emad Abdel Ghafour, in response to the former supreme body’s vote of no-confidence.

Abdel Ghafour’s deputy Mostafa Khalifa had been named as his successor.

The body on Wednesday decided to include 27 new members, and refer to investigation 12 members who had withdrawn their confidence in Abdel Ghafour.

It also decided to postpone the party branch elections scheduled for Friday in nine governorates.

The Nour Party is the second largest Islamist party in Egypt, and the main party representing the Salafis. Its former supreme body withdrew confidence from Abdel Ghafour when he insisted on restructuring the membership committee before holding the elections in the governorates.

Abdel Ghafour said that the new supreme body will manage the party from Cairo and not Alexandria, and that most party members were against the withdrawal of confidence.

However, Secretary General Galal al-Morra and Ahmed Abdel Hamid, spokesperson for the party’s elections committee, said Abdel Ghafour has no authority and cannot make decisions since the supreme body withdrew confidence from him.

Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm

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Disputes in Nour Party exposed through dismissals and counterdismissals

by admin
September 26th, 2012

Disputes in the Salafi Nour Party materialized in the forms of dismissals and suspensions of members, after the party’s top decision making body dismissed the party’s president, Emad Abdel Ghafour, who replied by dismissing two top members of the party.

After a statement the party’s supreme body released announced the dismissal of Abdel Ghafour, he responded by dismissing Ashraf Thabet, the head of membership affairs in the party, and spokesperson Nader Bakkar, Abdel Ghafour said in a tweet. He characterized the dismissals as being for the sake of “cleansing.”

Disagreements have erupted in the recent months after internal elections, which members said were marred by violations, were stopped by Abdel Ghafour.

The supreme body decided after its meeting on Tuesday to appoint Mustafa Hussein Khalifa as Abdel Ghafour’s successor until the general assembly of the party is held to elect a new supreme body and president.

In a statement, the supreme body of the party attributed the dismissal to the fact that Abdel Ghafour is an assistant to the president of the republic.

President Mohamed Morsy had chosen Abdel Ghafour last month to be his adviser for outreach.

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Nour Party head rejects calls for protest if Shafiq elected president

by admin
May 26th, 2012

Emad Abdel Ghafour, head of the Salafi-led Nour Party, has rejected calls for taking to streets if former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq wins the presidential election.

In an interview with the London based Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper Saturday, Abdel Ghafour said “It does not make sense that we accept the premises, and then do not accept the results."

He said the first round of elections was fair and clean and that the “violations that occurred during the election are so few compared to the violations of the elections in Mubarak's era, when fraud was the base and integrity was an exception.”

“For the first time in Egypt's modern history, an election is held with a high degree of transparency."

According to unofficial figures broadcast on state TV, Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsy won 25.5 percent in the first round, followed by Shafiq with 24.8 percent. Sabbahi came third with 20.5 percent while moderate Islamist Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh won 17.8 percent.

Shafiq, a general and Hosni Mubarak's last prime minister, will face Morsy in the 16-17 June run-off vote.

Abdel Ghafour said that his party will deal with the next president even if he is not Islamist.

Emerging as the second-largest political force in the country following the removal of Mubarak, the Nour Party won more than a fifth of the seats in the People’s Assembly.

In April the party endorsed Abouel Fotouh as president.

Asked whether the party will support Morsy in the run-off, Abdel Ghafour said it hasn’t decided on the matter.

On Friday the Jama'a al-Islamiya announced its support of Morsy, saying that Shafiq is a counter-revolutionary candidate, and the group will take whatever measures possible to prevent a counter-revolutionary from reaching the presidency.

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Nour Party head rejects calls for protest if Shafiq elected president

by admin
May 26th, 2012

Emad Abdel Ghafour, head of the Salafi-led Nour Party, has rejected calls for taking to streets if former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq wins the presidential election.

In an interview with the London based Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper Saturday, Abdel Ghafour said “It does not make sense that we accept the premises, and then do not accept the results."

He said the first round of elections was fair and clean and that the “violations that occurred during the election are so few compared to the violations of the elections in Mubarak's era, when fraud was the base and integrity was an exception.”

“For the first time in Egypt's modern history, an election is held with a high degree of transparency."

According to unofficial figures broadcast on state TV, Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsy won 25.5 percent in the first round, followed by Shafiq with 24.8 percent. Sabbahi came third with 20.5 percent while moderate Islamist Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh won 17.8 percent.

Shafiq, a general and Hosni Mubarak's last prime minister, will face Morsy in the 16-17 June run-off vote.

Abdel Ghafour said that his party will deal with the next president even if he is not Islamist.

Emerging as the second-largest political force in the country following the removal of Mubarak, the Nour Party won more than a fifth of the seats in the People’s Assembly.

In April the party endorsed Abouel Fotouh as president.

Asked whether the party will support Morsy in the run-off, Abdel Ghafour said it hasn’t decided on the matter.

On Friday the Jama'a al-Islamiya announced its support of Morsy, saying that Shafiq is a counter-revolutionary candidate, and the group will take whatever measures possible to prevent a counter-revolutionary from reaching the presidency.

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FJP to start proceedings to dismiss cabinet

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March 27th, 2012

The Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party has said it would start the proceedings for dismissing Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri’s cabinet on Wednesday by rejecting its parliamentary briefing.

“Nineteen parliamentary committees and all political parties agree with the FJP’s desire to dismiss the cabinet,” said FJP MP Abdel Aziz Khalaf. “It is the cabinet that is plotting all the crises [from which] we suffer.”

Islam Fares, a young member of the Brotherhood, told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the young members were assigned to organize demonstrations against the cabinet in all universities on Tuesday, beginning with Al-Azhar University and ending in Tahrir Square.

Around 4,000 students protested inside the campus of Al-Azhar University in Cairo, calling for the Muslim Brotherhood to form a new government, Al-Masry Al-Youm reported.

Emad Abdel Ghafour, president of the Salafi-oriented Nour Party, said only a coalition government would be able to resolve the economic crisis.

“It is time the military council listened to the voice of reason and immediately dismissed the cabinet for its failure to manage the country during this difficult phase,” Abdel Ghafour said.

“It should also absolve itself of responsibility for overseeing the presidential elections and the preparation of the constitution, and leave it up to the political parties to handle,” he added.

FJP spokesperson Yousry Hammad said Ganzouri should meet with the Islamist parties in Parliament to consult with him on how to run the government if the military council decides not to remove him.

According to the Constitutional Declaration, only the SCAF has the right to appoint and dismiss the cabinet.

Translated from Al-Masry Al-Youm

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