As the political winds of change are ushering in democratic advances in other countries in the region, Egypt’s leader Hosni Mubarak has taken notice and promised to reform the electoral system to allow multiple parties to run in the upcoming presidential election. However, many citizens and international experts on democracy will no doubt question the legitimacy of the next election because leading opposition figure Ayman Nour remains imprisoned since January on charges of forging legal documents in order to help fund his political party, the Tomorrow Party. Nour vehemently denied these charges in a recent letter he wrote from prison in Egypt that was published in Newsweek. He characterized the charges as “an outrageous fabrication” and believes that some of his authentic documents were replaced with forged documents after he had submitted these papers. (Newsweek 3/14)

According to the opposition Party letter, the Tomorrow Party’s platform is founded on demands for an increase in the level of democracy in Egypt. Mustafa Kamel al-Sayed, a Professor of Political Science at Cairo University, believes that if Nour was allowed to run in the presidential election that he might receive between 20-30% of the vote and that “…it is this perception that he might be capable of getting a large number of votes that would get the government to try to deprive him of this opportunity of running as a presidential candidate.” (BBC News 3/9)

It is speculated that the U.S. displeasure with Mubarak’s action as well as Nour’s continued imprisonment led Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to cancel a recent visit she was planning on making to Egypt as part of her travel through the region to promote the Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. Nevertheless, Egypt remains unmoved and resentful at perceived U.S. interference in an Egyptian legal matter. Ibrahim Rafeir, a Parliament member of Mubarak’s National Democratic Party stated that “The case of Ayman Nour is in the hands of the Egyptian judicial system and the judicial system is just.” (BBC News 3/9)