Egypt keeps new parties on short leash

But it is in Egypt, the sleeping giant of the region, where the hope for change was perhaps greatest. Formally a republic, the country had some experience with liberal politics as recently as the 1950s. A large number of activists hark back to Egypt's liberal period when it was the region's intellectual and political leader.

"We want to reinvigorate the multi-party system, which is dying out here,'' says Mona Makram-Ebied, a Harvard-educated political scientist and a supporter of Nour's Ghad Party, or party of tomorrow. "There's a younger generation thirsting for a voice. They want to make a new and modern Egypt, and there's a great nostalgia to make Egypt what it was when it was the lodestar of the Arab world. But the system we have now is ossified, and it's standing in our way."

Ms. Makram-Ebeid, who comes from a prominent liberal political family, says reformers' hopes were lifted by a promise from the ruling party last month that it would make it easier for competitors to register. To her mind, the Ghad Party had jumped through every hoop put in front of it by the government.

The party has called for constitutional reforms that would create a parliamentary democracy and help prevent another leader from dominating the way President Hosni Mubarak has for the past 23-years. Therefore, Makram-Ebeid felt that no government committed to reform could continue to stand in their way. "Yet they still block us."

As dozens of party supporters gathered outside the Political Parties Court in Cairo earlier this month, expecting to hear their application had been approved (after four earlier denials), they were met with disappointment. The panel, composed of judges and members appointed by Mubarak's government, failed to reach a quorum when most of the government appointees failed to show up, blocking the party without having to issue an outright denial.

"When the government talks of reform, they are addressing foreign nations, and trying to fool the naïve,'' says Nour, who is also a lawyer. "They're just playing games with us."

So far, Nour has played the game right back. Having identified a loophole in the country's tight party registration law, which allows new parties a four month grace period to conduct limited activities while they await approval, he's created five parties with slight variations on the "Ghad" name in the past 20 months, registering a new name every time their application has been refused.

But he says time is running out, with elections scheduled for next October and no party offices beyond the one he runs in his Cairo constituency. "We think we could make inroads in a fair election. But now, we don't have a party newspaper and we can't really reach out to the people. I'll probably have to run for office as an independent again."

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