Egypt's interim President Adli Mansour said that it is important for the upcoming president to have popular support that would allow him to take whichever decisions necessary for development, in an interview with state-owned newspaper al-Ahram published on Monday.
“The next president will not be a Pharaoh,” Mansour said, adding that the new constitution, which passed after a public referendum in January, “protects the necessary powers to manage the affairs of the country of the head of state, but it also grants the House of Representatives the power to oust the president.”
Egypt's presidential elections are scheduled to take place next spring, an important step in the road map set forth by the army following the ouster of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi after mass protests against his rule.
Mansour was sworn in as interim President after Mursi's ouster on July 4.
The interim president praised Defence Minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi for “venturing his life" during the ouster of Mursi, who hailed from the Muslim Brotherhood.
Sisi, who was recently promoted to the rank of Field Marshal, has not announced his intention to run for the presidency yet, but it is highly expected that he wins the election.
Mansour ruled out reconciliation with the Brotherhood, which was declared a "terrorist group" after the bombing of a security headquarters in the Nile Delta's city of Dakahlia in December.
