Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi will address the country's newly elected House of Representatives on Saturday for the first time since taking office in June 2014.
Sources told Ahram Online that El-Sisi's speech will be addressing domestic and regional issues, including the country’s current economic situation.
Parliament's Secretary-General Ahmed Saaddin told reporters on Wednesday that the presidential Republican Guard was implementing final security measures in the parliament building in downtown Cairo for El-Sisi's visit.
"This is a routine measure,” Saaddin said, adding that “all parliamentary staff will be on duty on this day .”
Saaddin said that a number of foreign guests, primarily ambassadors of foreign countries and the speakers of a number of Arab parliaments, will be invited to attend the speech.
Egypt's new parliament is composed of 596 MPs, an unprecedented figure in Egypt's 150-year-old parliamentary history.
"This big number, in addition to more than 100 guests, will push the number of those attending the speech to more than 700," said Saaddin.
The last time an Egyptian president visited parliament was in December 2010 when the now-ousted president Hosni Mubarak addressed a newly-elected People's Assembly which was elected in a process marred by alleged widespread rigging by the then-ruling party, the NDP.
