A Word From the Prison: Dr. Ayman Nour’s Letter on the First Anniversary of the Egyptian Presidential Election

The following is a letter written by Dr. Ayman Nour, leader of Egypt's Al-Ghad party, on September 7, 2006, to mark the first anniversary of the Egyptian presidential election. The letter appeared in English on the FreeAymanNour website. [1]

Dr. Nour, who was runner-up in the election, was arrested in late January 2006 following allegations that he had forged documents relating to the establishment of his party. He was later sentenced to five years in prison.

“I thank those who elected me and those who imprisoned me.

“Yes, today completes a year of hope and pain. One year has passed since the first presidential election in Egypt's history. There is no need to go into details that are still in our nation's memory. Some issues are too significant to be [obliterated like] a page torn out of a book, a mountain deleted from a map, a moon whose blue fire is extinguished, or a river that an administrative decision can stop and change its course.

“The bruises, wounds and broken bones we suffer are not important, for this is the price that some have decided [that we must pay]. It is important to realize that the clock cannot be not turned back, and we must not accept that it should be turned back.

“It is not important to save your [own] skin [if the price is] losing your dignity and giving up your position and what is not yours to give up. The ‘official’ results [of the election], despite all the changes that they were subjected to, [still] indicate that over half a million voters, representing 7.8% of Egyptian voters, dreamt with us and hoped for change.

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“Yes, the dream is not yet been fulfilled. However, when peoples exercise their legitimate right to dream, it is inevitable that their legitimate dreams will soon be fulfilled. The peoples' living dreams are a statement that [even] the strongest censor can not obliterate. The censor may be able to postpone [their fulfillment], but he does not have the power to obliterate them or avoid their impact.

“One year has passed and scent of heroism suffuses every part of this country - the villages and the cities, Lower and Upper Egypt, the streets and the alleys, the mosques and the churches.

“One year has passed since September 7, 2005 - the day on which millions of Egyptians tried in vain [to exercise their right] to vote. The doors on which they knocked were slammed in their faces by those who refused to allow them to vote using their ID cards, [and thus] restricted this right to only 25% of the [Egyptian] citizens, who were given the right to choose their ruler. [2] These people [who were prevented from voting] were armed with nothing but their desire for change and reform. With their bare hands, they could have changed criteria, modified policies, renewed values and changed theories. This was not possible, however, because they were deprived of their right to vote.

“When the amendment to Article 76 [of the Egyptian constitution] [3] was announced in February 2005, the authorities had already stopped issuing voting cards and refused to allow citizens to vote using their ID cards, as is the practice in presidential elections all over the world. Voting cards that determine local constituencies are irrelevant in presidential elections since these are elections to choose the country's president, in which every citizen has the [right to] vote.”