El-Zomor: Negotiations ongoing to create Islamist electoral coalition

An Islamist electoral coalition, excluding the Muslim Brotherhood, is in the making says Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya's official spokesperson Tarek El-Zomor Gamaa Islamiya's official spokesperson, Tarek El-Zomor, told Ahram's Arabic-language website Sunday that negotiations were ongoing to create an Islamist coalition to run for the next parliamentary elections. The coalition will exclude the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP). Although Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya had run on the FJP list in the last parliamentary elections, El-Zomor says the experience was not satisfactory, confirming his group will be seeking a different form of Islamist coalition in the coming elections. Ongoing negotiations led by El-Zomor began Thursday in Al-Gamaa Al-Islamiya's headquarters in Cairo's Mohandeseen district and included former Nour Party Chairman Emad Abdel-Ghafour, who is currently seeking to form a new Salafist party named El-Watan, as well as representatives from the Hazemoon (supporters of Salafist figure Hazem Abu-Ismail) movement. In the 2011 parliamentary elections, the Salafist Nour Party in addition to several other Salafist political parties refused to join the Muslim Brotherhood's electoral coalition named the "Democratic Alliance" and instead created another named the "Islamist Bloc" which was able to garner more than 20 per cent of the total number of seats. From Ahramonline