Egypt ratified a new Islamist-backed constitution on Tuesday, a move that many here hope will end weeks of bitter political turmoil.
The country’s high electoral commission announced the charter’s official approval at a Tuesday night news conference in Cairo. Nearly 64 percent of the 17 million Egyptians who voted in a national referendum this month approved the document.
The new constitution officially replaces the country’s 1971 charter, which was written under the military regime of Anwar Sadat and remained in place until the aftermath of the popular uprising that ousted Sadat’s successor, Hosni Mubarak, in February, 2011.
The charter’s adoption signifies a victory for Egypt’s elected president, Mohamed Morsi, and his Islamist backers, after months of political conflict that saw the Islamists square off against a broad but disparate opposition composed of of liberals, secularists and old regime loyalists. Protests from both sides, over the balance of power in the new Egypt and the religious character of its guiding charter, occasionally devolved into violence.
Critics of the new charter say it will deepen the influence of Islamic law, while failing to protect the rights of women and minority groups. But opposition leaders, who mounted a last-minute campaign for a “No” vote in last week’s referendum, said over the weekend that their failure to defeat the document had still yielded some positive points.
The opposition accused Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood of carrying out mass fraud in the two-phase vote, but leaders said that the high number of “No” votes — some 36 percent — signifies an important show of force as the country hurtles toward a new round of elections in two months.
Under the new charter, the government must hold elections for the lower house of parliament within 60 days. It is a contest that the opposition said it is likely to contest, while continuing its push to annul the new constitution.
“We can say that we are diversifying our options, using all possible means to say that Egypt is not up for this kind of extortion,” said Hussein Abdelghani, a spokesman for the opposition’s main alliance, the National Salvation Front.
Regardless of the constitution’s approval, Abdelghani said that politics in Egypt would be different in the months ahead.
“Now there is a balance in political life. This is what changed in the last month and a half,” he said. “The [opposition] now has a title, and there is a force now to contend with the Islamists.”
