Several Egyptian political parties took part in a second round of public consultations focused on election laws yesterday, as the countdown to parliamentary elections at the end of 2020 begins, Ahram Online reports. The talks, which follow a first round of talks held in early December, are being spearheaded by the Mostakbal Watan party, which since May 2018 has held the largest number of seats of any party in the House of Representatives. The conversations were expected to focus on laws regulating the parliamentary elections, the performance of the House of Representatives and the Senate, the exercise of political rights and redrawing of electoral districts. The hope is that a consensus on the electoral system will be reached, and then applied in the coming elections, said leader of the Support Egypt majority coalition Abdel Hadi El Qasabi.

What are the sticking points so far? In the first round of conversations, several opposition parties said they wanted to see the adoption of a proportional list system, rather than the closed list system, in electing the House of Representatives and the Senate; that they did not want the security services to take part in supervising the election; and that all political bodies should have fair and equal coverage by national media, Mostakbal Watan party head Ashraf Rashad told Ahram Online. These first discussions saw representation from high-profile political parties, including the Reform and Development party and the Egyptian Democratic Socialist party.