Revolution

Egypt Dissolves Former Ruling Party

Meeting key demand of protesters.

Two months after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak resigned, his National Democratic Party is being dissolved. A court ordered that the former ruling party dissolve and hand over its funds to the government, meeting one of the key demands of the protest movement. Lawyers had raised a suit accusing the party of corruption, and much of its senior leadership is already in prison for corruption. Pro-democracy activists feared the party would dominate elections scheduled for September. The NDP had dominated Egyptian politics since its founding by Anwar el-Sadat in 1978. Since the revolution, however, there had been attempts to rebrand the party, with the appointment of Talet el-Sadat, an outspoken opposition figure, as the party's secretary-general. The dissolution of the NDP comes days after Mubarak and his sons were put under detention for investigation into allegations and corruption and the killing of protesters.