Letter to Cairo Dialogues on the Electoral Process

By / Dr. Essam Adwan

In the coming days, dialogues will be held in Cairo between the Palestinian factions on the electoral process and discussing the mechanisms and guarantees of the elections and a number of national files related to them. Whereas elections have become a binding option agreed upon and issued by presidential decree, Whereas, this opportunity has been absent for more than ten years. Therefore, it must be dealt with with the utmost seriousness, Catching up with everything would make its outputs stronger and more beneficial.

First of all:

The inability to hold elections for the Palestinian National Council abroad must not be recognized, Every effort must be made to reach elections for foreign representatives.

These include: The formation of a Higher National Committee chaired by the current PLO and the membership of a representative of each Palestinian faction; Its mission is to work to convince Arab and non-Arab governments that have Palestinians on their territory. The necessity, importance and possibility of establishing an electoral register for Palestinians and signing an agreement regulating the relations of holders of dual citizenship, And arrange for elections for the National Assembly according to their percentage of the population.

Secondly:

Since the establishment of the Palestinian National Council in 1964, there have been popular unions such as the General Union of Palestinian Students and the Workers’ Union. These unions have continued to represent a significant proportion of the membership of the National Council to date.

Membership of popular unions has always been limited to PLO factions, although they are professional associations before they were political.

Thus, there is a major distortion in the composition of these federations and in their representation of their professional sectors. These unions are:

1. General Union of Palestinian Jurists

2. Arab Network for Culture, Opinion and Media

3. General Union of the Palestinian Handicapped

4. General Union of Palestinian Physicians and Pharmacists

5. General Union of Palestinian Students

6. General Union of Palestinian Writers

7. General Union of Palestinian Engineers

8. General Union of Palestinian Teachers

9. General Union of Palestinian Women

10. General Federation of Palestinian Workers

11. General Union of Palestinian Expressive Artists

12. General Union of Palestinian Farmers

13. General Union of Palestinian Economists

14. Supreme Council for Youth and Sports

See also: In a letter to the Cairo Dialogues on the electoral process:

It is necessary to rehabilitate the membership and role of the Palestinian popular unions by agreeing in Cairo on:

 Open the door of membership to any professional person who proves his close and effective contact with the profession, And sifting the existing memberships to remove everyone who does not fall professionally under them or no longer practices the profession due to his old age. This stage takes two months.

 It is agreed in Cairo on the right of all members of the federations during the next two months or earlier to run for membership of the administrative body in the regions. Elections of the governing bodies of the federations of the regions are held within a third month.

 The administrative bodies of the federations in the regions shall hold elections for the supreme administrative body within a fourth month.

The supreme administrative body of each federation shall elect one member for every 20,000 members of the federations to represent it in the Palestinian National Council in their representative capacity and not in their persons. They shall be changed in each electoral cycle of the federations, which must precede the end of the session of the National Assembly by four months, It shall be renewed even if elections for the National Assembly are not held for any compelling reason.

 There are professional sectors for which a general union has not been formed. It may be agreed to form a federation immediately so that the National Council absorbs all the professional competencies of the Palestinian people at home and abroad.

These include: General Union of Palestinian Academics, The General Union of Non-Working University and Institute Graduates, The General Union of Religious Scholars (Muslims and Christians), The General Union of Accountants, and the General Union of Geographers. Or these unions can be completed after the formation of the next council.

Read also:

Election of a Palestinian National Council

Thirdly:

There are thousands of Palestinians abroad in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. A way must be found for them to participate in the elections for the Legislative Council and the Presidency in their places.

Fourthly:

There is nothing to prevent Palestinians abroad from participating in elections through well-prepared electronic means and appropriate monitoring.

Fifthly:

Most Palestinian factions have military wings. Each faction can allocate the proportion that suits it from among its list to its military wing, This is in order to represent the military arms in the Palestinian National Council.

Some may invoke lack of time, or that this will be rectified after the formation of the Council, But these pretexts are an expression of weak will or bad intentions, Our people can implement all this in four months if there is a will and sincere intentions. The renewal of the popular unions will reflect the seriousness of the current PLO leadership in the process of reforming and activating the PLO.