Protesters outside State Council, Tuesday (Photo: Mai Shaheen)
Egypt’s State Council has adjourned on Tuesday a lawsuit which asks for the nullification of the parliamentary decision to form a 100-member constituent assembly tasked with drafting a new constitution to 10 April, 2011.
A number of prominent lawyers including Mohamed Shehata, head of the Arab Center for Transparency and Integrity, Sameh Ashour, a former head of the lawyers' syndicate, Khaled Ali, the potential presidential candidate , are among those who filed the lawsuit against the parliament, challenging the constitutionality of its 50-50 decision.
The Islamist-dominated parliament had voted on 17 March to allocate 50 seats in the assembly to members of parliament (MPs), and, moreover, allowed the MPs to choose the remaining half of the assembly members from outside the legislative body.
On Sunday, the final list of members of the 100-member constituent assembly was announced causing an outcry from liberal and leftist forces after Islamists won 65 per cent of assembly seats, including 50 members from the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) and Salafist Nour Party.
The parliament was represented in Tuesday's hearing session by Ahmed Abu Baraka, a well known lawyer and a leading MP for the FJP.
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