President Hosni Mubarak vowed to deliver on pledges for reform when he was sworn in Tuesday for a fifth term in office after sweeping to victory in Egypt’s first contested presidential poll.
”I will work with the utmost determination towards the implementation of the programme I proposed during the electoral campaign,” Mubarak said after taking the oath of office in a ceremony in Parliament.
”This election was not the end, what is important now is to realise the aspirations of the people and march forward. We will do this with an unalterable determination to pursue reform.”
Canons were fired from the Parliament compound after Mubarak was sworn in, marking the beginning of his fifth six-year term at the helm of the Arab world’s most populous country following the election on September 7.
Under pressure at home and abroad, the 77-year-old Mubarak, the region’s longest serving leader after Libya’s Moammar Gaddafi, has pledged to embark on greater democratic reform.
Gaddafi was in Cairo for Mubarak’s swearing-in.
Mubarak, who has ruled under a state of emergency imposed after the 1981 assassination of his predecessor Anwar al-Sadat, swept to a landslide victory in the country’s first multi-candidate poll.
Official results gave Mubarak 88,5% of the vote, but low turnout meant that those who voted for the president represented less than nine percent of Egypt’s overall population.
”We will hold legislative elections in November which will complete the experience of the presidential election,” Mubarak said, vowing to ”pursue democratisation and economic liberalisation”.
During a campaign which for the first time saw rivals and newspapers openly attacking his regime, Mubarak promised to lift the state of emergency and create more than four million jobs.
Critics of the veteran leader have pointed out that unemployment is at least twice as high as the official 10% and argued that his plan to create jobs and raise wages was unrealistic.
The Egyptian government handed in its resignation, but Mubarak issued a decree asking the Cabinet to continue until a reshuffle after the parliamentary elections in November.
Many of the nine defeated candidates in the September vote challenged the results, complaining of fraud and other irregularities, in protests which were backed by local non-governmental organisations which had monitored the polls.
Even the reform that led to the opening up of the presidential contest was criticised, with many candidates barred from standing while others refused to put anyone forward saying the outcome was a foregone conclusion.
After meeting Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif on Monday, new United States Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy Karen Hughes reminded Mubarak of his pledge to lift emergency laws, but Nazif told her it would take time.
When the government reshuffle takes place, pro-Western reformists within the ruling National Democratic Party and headed by Mubarak’s son Gamal seem likely to get some key posts.
Gamal’s growing influence within the ruling party prompted speculation that he was being groomed to succeed his father, drawing criticism from opposition leaders and activists.
That position was echoed in the first issue of the country’s newest weekly newspaper, Al-Karama (Dignity), which declared itself against hereditary power in Egypt.
”We swear by God almighty that Gamal Mubarak will not inherit us,” read a banner headline in the paper, mouthpiece of the would-be Al-Karama party of Nasserist MP Hamdeen Sabahi.
Critics of the pace of reform hope that the reported defects in September’s vote will have been ironed out by the legislative elections.
”The parliamentary polls will be free and fair,” Mubarak promised in his speech.
Many see November’s vote as more politically significant than the presidential election, as the next People’s Assembly will be tasked with discussing wide-ranging reforms.
The legislative polls kick off on November 8 for a period of three weeks, with the NDP currently controlling 404 out of 454 seats. – Sapa-AFP