CAIRO - EgyptÂ’s parliament voted to expel an opposition lawmaker and nephew to the late President Anwar Sadat on Tuesday after a court ruling declaring him bankrupt. Parliament voted 316 to 88 to expel Mohamed Anwar Esmat Sadat, based on a recommendation by the assemblyÂ’s constitutional and legislative affairs committee made on Sunday.
Sadat, who in the past has spoken out against alleged corruption in the government, told parliament shortly before the vote that he considered his expulsion to be politically motivated, and said that other parliamentarians had been granted reprieves in similar circumstances.
| Apparently he owed money to the wrong people. |
Parliamentary sources said Sadat had produced documentation to prove he had paid off his debts, but speaker of parliament Fathi Surour told him that only a new court ruling could overturn the existing ruling that declared him bankrupt.
Sadat was elected to parliament in 2005 as an independent, although he recently joined the liberal Democratic Front party, which the authorities agreed to recognise last week.
A year ago a military tribunal sentenced Talaat Sadat, Mohamed Anwar Esmat SadatÂ’s brother and also then a member of parliament, to a year in jail for insulting the armed forces. Talaat was quoted in the media as saying he believed the 1981 assassination of his uncle was a conspiracy in which senior Egyptian military officials at the time were involved.
| Very likely true, and damned inconvenient of you to say so. |
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