A renowned lawyer and activist, 40-years-old Khaled Ali has made a name for himself among the poor by promoting social justice and defending the rights of workers, peasants, and students over the course of the last two decades.
Born in1972 in the Nile Delta governorate of Daqahliya, Ali graduated from Zagazig University’s law faculty in 1995.
In 1999, along with Ahmed Seif El-Islam, the prominent human rights lawyer and former LAC partner, he founded the Hisham Mubarak Law Centre (HMLC), a law firm that has since become a major player in the country’s human rights scene. Ali served as HMLC executive director from 2007 to 2009.
In 2009, Ali founded the Egyptian Centre for Economic and Social Rights (ECESR), a prominent human and labour rights advocacy group of which he was director until February of this year. He resigned his post at the ECESR, however, upon announcing his intention to run for Egypt’s presidency.
He has achieved a number of notable victories as a lawyer. Most famously, in March 2010, he obtained a landmark ruling in a class-action lawsuit that mandated an LE1,200 minimum wage for public-sector workers.
Ali announced his intention to run for president in late February 2012 on a program of achieving the revolutions goals. His presidential campaign emphasises social equity, the redistribution of wealth, civil liberties and the revolutionary course as a continuing struggle.
Ali gathered the required 30 endorsement-signatures from members of parliament, and officially filed his presidential papers on 7 April.
Filmed and edited by: Simon Hanna
Interview: Mostafa Ali and Nada El-Kouny