MPs referred to Speaker's Staff Office for violating rules

CAIRO – 16 May 2018: Egypt’s Parliament speaker, Ali Abdel Aal, has referred on Tuesday a number of parliamentarians to Speaker's Staff Office after they traveled to Norway with expelled MP Mohamed Anwar al-Sadat, ignoring the Parliament’s warning against leaving the country.

The referred MPs are Ahmad Tantawi, Ahmad al-Bardisi, Iman Khedr, Talat Khalil and Shadid Abu Hindi. According to sources in the Parliament, the Speaker's Staff Office is expected to refer them to the Ethics Committee which is responsible for looking into the violations committed by MPs towards the Egyptian society's code of behavior, religion, social standards, etc.

The Speaker's Staff Office is responsible for the enforcement of Parliament‘s orders and is the link between the House and different agencies, ministries and other authorities. It consists of the Parliament’s speaker and his two deputies.

In February 2018, the Parliament had stripped Sadat of his membership after more than the two-thirds of the 596-member House voted for the decision in a roll call.

The decision came after the Parliament's Legislative and Constitutional Affairs Committee found Sadat guilty of leaking information related to internal conditions in Egypt to international institutions, aiming to tarnish the image of the Parliament.

The committee said that Sadat was also found guilty of forging the signatures of 16 MPs on two draft laws he had prepared on criminal procedures and NGOs.