[Fwd: Labour Revolt]

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http://www.ahram.org.eg/weekly/2000/482/fr3.htm

Al-Ahram Weekly
18 - 24 May 2000
Issue No. 482

Labour revolt

     THE CONTROVERSY over Syrian novelist Haydar Haydar's A Banquet for
Seaweed,
     denounced by the Labour Party's mouthpiece Al-Shaab as blasphemous,
took a dramatic
     twist on Tuesday when Hamdi Ahmed and Ahmed Idris, two former
leading figures in the
     Islamist-oriented group, along with dozens of supporters, seized
the party offices in Hadayeq
     Al-Quba and Nasr City, both in Cairo. They declared the Islamist
leadership of party
     Chairman Ibrahim Shukri and Secretary-General Adel Hussein
overthrown, and vowed to
     return the party to its former "socialist" orientation.

     The rebellion came in the midst of heated confrontation between the
Labour Party and its
     paper on one hand and the government and secular intellectuals on
the other. Al-Shaab's
     fiery campaign against Haydar's novel, and the Egyptian Ministry of
Culture for publishing it,
     has been blamed for inciting student rioting last week. Writers and
intellectuals have
     described Al-Shaab's campaign as a witch hunt and "incitement to
murder," while security
     bodies seemed to view it as a cynical attempt at "early
campaigning" by the Islamists for
     November's parliamentary elections.

     At a press conference yesterday Shukri and Hussein declared the
internal party rebellion
     illegal and warned the government against attempting to suspend the
party's activities, a
     suggestion that has been urged by a number of editors of the
national press.




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