Transcript of interview with Egyptian prime minister
Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif spoke to USA TODAY's Barbara Slavin in Washington on Sunday. Major elements from their discussion:
Question: I lived in Egypt in the days when Egyptians still liked Americans. Now when you say you are from America, you don't get the smiles you used to. Why are Americans so unpopular now in Egypt?
Answer: Egyptians are very kind people by nature. And kind people are easy to influence. Even if they think the U.S. today is not as nice as it should be, they still have hopes for the relationship in many ways. What we are seeing is more like turbulence in a relationship that cannot afford to go sour. That is why I am here, actually. To make sure we mend this image. I'm sure the same applies another way around. The U.S. has to see Egypt in its proper context. We have to remind people of what Egypt stands for and I think President Bush has done that in an eloquent way. He described Egypt as a great nation which led the peace in the Middle East. We should not forget that, that was only 30 years ago.
Q. You mentioned President Bush. He also said Egypt should lead in political reform.
A. And we take that seriously. We believe that Egypt is and will lead in deepening democracy in the Middle East.
Q. The changes you have proposed strike many in this country as rather limited. They feel that the deck is still very much stacked toward the ruling party and President Mubarak.
A. I think that is a misreading. You need to see how much out of our way we've gone in terms of making sure that this election would attract candiates. Just to give you an example. We are changing our constitution. When you change a constitution, you're not just looking under your feet. This is a long process. You want to make sure it will be there for the next tens of years, not one or two or five. What we've done is we've put together a system that will allow political parties to nominate candidates and would allow independents under different constraints to also nominate candidates. The constraint of political parties is that they would have 5% of parliamentary seats which in our lower parliament of 444 seats, that's 22 seats. In our Shura council (upper house), that's 8 seats. So it's not a big deal. We then exempted the next election from that condition which means any political party in Egypt even if it was formed yesterday can nominate a candidate for the next presidential election. It is that simple. Forget skepticism, forget people who are afraid to run.
Q. It's my understanding you need the support of 65 members of parliament to run.
A. That's only if you are running as an independent. You need 250 signatures from elected representatives, 65 of which should come from the parliament. We have 19 political parties in Egypt including the ruling party. Which means we could have 19 candidates in the next election.
Q. Will Ayman Nour be able to run?
A. Of course, he is part of one of the parties. He is a leader of one of the parties. There is no restriction. It's a little bit frustrating when somebody comes up with a bold move like the president has done with his initiative to change the constitution and then most of the reaction is a skeptical one rather than an encouragement of what he is trying to do. We have to give him, Egypt, the benefit of the doubt. Why don't we wait and see how the elections will come out. Why don't we wait and see who is going to run. The challenge is on the leaders of the oppositon parties including Mr. Nour and others. Let them show their material. Let them come in with their programs. All we hear from them always is, 'we need more democracy.' Now let's hear what they are going to do about unemployment. What are you going to do about the budget deficit? What are you going to do about our pension reform system? That's what the Egyptians want to hear.
Q. The Muslim Brotherhood remains banned. Hundreds of them have been arrested in recent weeks. How are you ever going to find a way to allow this very important part of the Egyptian body politic to take some sort of role in governing the country?
A. We're not. It's that simple. Our constitution does not allow it. We will not allow poltical parties based on religion. Not many countries would do that. Would you like to see in Egypt a party for Islam and a party for Christianity and a party for Judaism? That's what they stand for. How can we allow that?
Q. So these people have to choose to run on other tickets?
A. Members of the Muslim Brotherhood have representatives in parliament as independents. They are welcome to do that.
Q. You can't imagine a case in Egypt where there would be the equivalent of a Muslim Democratic party? Something like the Justice party in Turkey?
A. Would you have a party like that in your country that bans people from coming into it? There's no standard for democracy. No one size fits all solution. Turkey might see this as a plus. We don't. We don't think we should have a party for women, a party for young people that bans old people. We don't think we should have a party for Muslims.
Q. Let me ask about the Bush administration efforts to promote democracy. Whether its been at all helpful or counterproductive. Do you think the Bush administration knows what it's doing in the Middle East?
A. I think the president knows what should happen. I believe that nobody would disagree with his call for deepening democracy. It's an honorable and most worthy thing. The problem is how and when, meaning the method and the pace. That's where different countries will respond in different ways. The role of the United States in this case should be the role of an adviser.
Q. What is your feeling now about Iraq? Are you at all optimistic that the violence is going to ease and that the Iraqis are going to be able to govern this place on their own?
A. I think it's going to take some time. It's still a challenge. It's something that merits from all of us more effort, from all countres that can help. We need to make sure that security and peace can prevail and this can only happen if first of all, we break in the Iraqis, train them enough to be able to get there. As long as you see the stereotype of a foreigner with a gun in the streets of Baghdad, you risk having this. At the same time, does this mean we can remove U.S. forces from Iraq today? The answer is no. That's not possible.
Q. Are you concerned that Iraq is becoming the next Afghanistan, a school for jihadists who will then return to their home countries?
A. I hope not. I think we need to focus on this not happening. In addition to security, we need to be able to address all the factions, all the people who need to be involved in the politifcal process. Inclusion and security are the key factors there.
Q. Is Egypt doing anything to help the Iraqis?
A. We have been announcing that we will train any number of Iraqi forces.
Q. Have you trained any?
A. One hundred and forty five of them. We declared that we were willing to train thousands. That did not happen.The U.S. and others decided how they want to train the Iraqis. On the other side, we are willing to help in the inclusion process, in talking to all factions. You have to remember before the first war in Iraq, we had 2 million Egypgtians living in Iraq. We understand them very well and they understand us very well. We can talk to all factions either formally or informally to bring them in. The third part of the equation would be the economic side. Here again we can help. We have Egyptians working there to rebuild the infrastructure today. The mobile telephone system in Iraq is done by an Egyptian company. Some of our engineers were kidnapped as well. But we're taking the risk because we believe that the Iraqis deserve to see a better life after Saddam. If the only thing they can see is insecurity because of unsafe streets, less jobs and an infrastructure that has not been rebuilt yet, that will also remain a problem.
Q. Let's talk about economic reforms. You've floated the pound, increased privatization yet a lot of Egyptians say they still don't feel any improvement. Are you disappointed with the reaction to what you've done? What more do you plan to do?
A. I'm not disappointed. I'm very encouraged by what has happened so far. I understand that people want to see results. We came in with a very important objective in mind. To restore confidence in the government. People want to see their government as forthcoming about their problems and how they want to solve them. We came in the first day. I said, 'Listen we're going to do a lot of reforms. Some of them are tough and in some cases, it will take a longer time than you expect. Don't expect to see results in the street for 18-24 months.' Having said that, we did bring in some results earlier than that. One of the most important is a restoration of confidence in the government. We restored hope, just because of the new faces that came in. We cut taxes by more than 50%, corporate taxes from 42% to 20%. We cut customs from 15% to an average 9%. We improved the business environment. We have restructured many of the government organizations. Just to send a strong signal to investors that we mean business. Our motto is: Egypt is open for business.
Q.How is foreign investment doing?
A. Last year, the total foreign investment was $408 million, very meager. In nine months, since we came to office in July, til March, that number exceeded a billion. That's not our target yet. Our target is $3 billion per year and I think we're well on our way. Things are moving. The Cairo-Alexandria stock exchange was ranked number one in the world in February. Today it's number two.
Q. What areas is this investment coming in?
A. Mostly in tourism. Also oil and gas exploration, which is not included in the $1 billion.
In privatization programs, the privatization program was stalling in Egypt but we have taken very bold steps. Remittances from privatization in those nine months is four times what it was in the last five years. We're selling cement, some banks are up for grabs now. So the macro side of things is starting to show. And in some cases, even the people on the street felt it. They felt it in more jobs coming in. We're seeing 70-80% increases in the number and size of ads for private sector jobs. When we came in, we stopped hiring for government, a very unpopular decisoin.
Q. How many people are in the Mogamma (a huge government building in downtown Cairo)?
A. 20,000. In a year I may close it down. I'm actually thinking of turning it into a hotel.
Q. Let me ask about Israel and the Gaza withdrawal. That's been put back a few weeks. Are you confident it will happen and what is Egypt doing to facilitate it?
A. As you know, we've been very active. The first thing we did very successfully was to bring calm to the area. Now we need more confidence-building measures. The Israelis have their part to play. We need to see them releasing more prisoners, withdrawing from more areas and showing more tolerance to some of the incidents that might be happening. We are trying to build up confidence. We are working with the Palestinian factions, all of them. We had in Cairo 13 factions including Hamas.
All those are very positive signs that have not yet taken the appreciation that they should from the Israelis. We need the U.S. more involved.
Q. What do mean? We have Gen. Ward involved on the security front, Jim Wolfensohn on the economic front.
A. I'm talking about what would be felt by both sides.They need assurances, both the Israeli side and the Palestinian side, that the U.S. is there for them on the security issues and the economic issues. Palestinians need to see a future, they need to see a process, they need to see better lives. Security is not the only issue, jobs is as important.
Q. Do you want President Bush to convince Israelis to start a process to talk about final status issues?
A. At least some confidence-building measures. They need to show that the withdrawal is real. They withdraw from some areas, they come back the next day. They need to make sure the Gaza process is clear. There are many Palestinians working in Israeli establishments. What's going to happen to them?
You need to show them a process. You need to reassure them that they'll have jobs. You need to rebuild their infrastructure. I remember an Egyptian company built the airport in Gaza. It was a source of pride at the time, now it is destroyed. We'll be helping on the security side, the economic side, the political side. This is for us a national security issue. This is our national interest at stake. It is our eastern border. We don't take that lightly .
Q. Have you moved your 750 troops up to the border?
A. It's still under negotiation. Whether it's Gaza only or the whole border. But we're committed to securing that border. The Israelis think there is a lot of arms smuggling there. We need to assure them that this is not the case. We can play a role but they have to help us as well. If they can't trust us after 30 years, I don't know who they can trust.
Q. You've had some unfortunate incidents recently involving terrorism, the hotel bombing, the bombing in Khan el-Khalili. Are you concerned that this phenomen is reappearing?
A. Our investigation showed that these were more of an unorganized event. The incident in Taba was mostly poeople from the area targetting Israeli tourists, the incident in Khan el Khalili (a traditional market in Cairo) was a family of young Egyptians that worked independently but were obviously under the influence of that kind of extremist thinking. It is something that should not be taken lightly. As you know, our economy depends on tourism. Thank God, so far, there is no affect on the tourism industry. If these things keep happening, then we will suffer. Terrorism exists. It's everywhere. You know we were one of the earliest to suffer from terrorism. Our president was assassinated.
Q. The flip side of this is that you have this emergency law in effect since Sadat was killed and every time it's suggested that you lift it, something like this happens. Some would say it's a pretext for not lifting the emergency.
A. You know they accuse us of planning this. That's how skeptical people are.
Q. Are you ever going to lift the emergency law?
A. If we're going to lift it, we need an alternative. An anti-terrorist act like your Patriot Act. When the U.S. got subject to terrorism, it acted with a law. That's what we did. Why are people blaming us for that?
Q. Your emergency law is a bit more Draconian than our Patriot Act. Any thought to replace it?
A.There is defnitely. This is something on the agenda. We have so much to do. One thing that the president was adamant about that the law would not be used outside that context.
Q. You have other laws to repress dissent, for example with Saad Eddin Ibrahim, laws used to put people in jail unjustly.
A. Where is Saad Eddin Ibrahim today?
Q. He's not the man he was before he went into jail, before he suffered strokes and could walk with an easy gait.
A. He went through a judiciary process and walked out of it.
Q. Why was he arrested to begin with? Is there any thought to changing those regulations?
A. Definitely. Egypt today is going through a process of maturity that allows debate and questioning. There are no limits, no off limits any more. We have a national dialgoue in place, a political party system looking into those emergencies. The judiciary in Egypt has been issuing statements saying they're not happy with their own role. This is a maturing process. Our challenge is to make sure this happens in a peaceful, democratic and civilized way in a country that still suffers from terrorist acts.
Q. Some of your judges say they won't take part in certifying the presidential elections. Even though you describe the process as open, they are afraid the government will manipulate the election results.
A. We need to prove that this is not the case. I believe in the end the judges will supervise the elections. It is their constitutional duty to do it.
Q. Will you allow foreign observers to come in?
A. That's a possibility. Having said that, you know the judges are the first to oppose that. That tells you something about the evolutionary process. Change is happening but I must emphasize the pace is up to us.
Q. Has the president decided whether he's going to run?
A. He hasn't. He's said he's going to declare after the referendum on the 25th of May.
Q. Will his son run?
A. Gamal has declared he will not run for the presidency this time. But Gamal is an Egyptian. He has the right to run. Of course, it's unheard of in any country in the world that a son of a president becomes president.
