By Hend Kortam

Long before election season set in, news of the much-coveted "For the Love of Egypt" electoral coalition occupied the media, riding a wave of hyper-nationalism set in motion by the removal of the Muslim Brotherhood from power by the military in July 2013.

Bringing together 10 political parties, the alliance is the most recognisable among the six lists contesting 120 seats in Egypt's upcoming parliamentary elections.

Unsurprisingly, it is the brainchild of former military intelligence general Sameh Seif Elyazal, who now heads pro-government think tank The Republican Center for Political and Security Studies.

Coalition spokesman Emad Gad told Aswat Masriya in an interview that the alliance is "electoral," not political and will cease to exist once it claims its place in parliament.

Nonetheless, the list is betting on winning all 120 seats assigned to lists across the nation.

With equal confidence Elyazal told Reuters in an interview earlier this week that the list would compete for all seats and "eventually seek to curb the legislature's wide-ranging powers" by forming a bloc to lead the house. The 70-year-old is also contesting a seat, running at the top of the list he created.

To that end, "For the Love of Egypt" has made its presence known, being the only list pushing forward candidates in all four corners, the north, south, east and west delta regions. In the East Delta, the list is running unopposed and only needs five percent of the votes to win.

The alliance includes political parties like al-Wafd, which has earned for itself a reputation of siding with those in power, and the liberal-leaning Free Egyptians Party founded by telecom tycoon Naguib Sawiris, of which Gad is a member.

The upcoming elections are due to be held over two phases, the first taking place next week. The second phase will run from Nov 21-23, bringing to an end the polling process for Egypt's 568-member House of Representatives.

This is the second time Egyptians have been asked to choose their representatives since the 2011 uprising that toppled former president Hosni Mubarak.

While Mubarak's removal marked the disbanding of his ruling party, the National Democratic Party (NDP), ex-members of the now defunct party are at the epicentre of competition in several provinces, with some hoping to reclaim their place in the legislature through "For the Love of Egypt" list.

Gad defended the inclusion of former NDP members, asserting that the law does not ban them from practicing their political right to run for parliament. Some of them remain "the notables" of families in Upper Egypt and the Delta and have not been implicated in corruption cases, said Gad.

Yet, the list is far less inclusive when it comes to Islamist candidates. Gad believes the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) has committed a "crime against the nation" and has "destroyed the Egyptian identity", a view he shares with Elyazal who warned that the MB will find their way into parliament, first running as independents, then revealing their true affiliation, he told Reuters.

Between them, Gad and Elyazal project that Islamists, including the Salafi al-Nour Party which had allied with the military against the Brotherhood, would rake from five to seven percent of parlaimentary seats.

Parliament's Daunting Task?

Over the course of the past two years, in the absence of an elected parliament, Interim President Adly Mansour and current President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi had held legislative power, which they used to pass some 300 laws.

The upcoming parliament is required by law to review these legislations, some of which have been the subject of fierce societal debate, within 15 days of convening, a task which Elyazal believes is "impossible".

He told Reuters, that the laws should be endorsed first and debated later, almost agreeing with Gad who believes that only the more controversial five percent of those laws will require discussion, contending that "the rest are undisputed." 

The upcoming parliament has been assigned many powers including the authority to withdraw confidence from the prime minister, other ministers or even the president. Article 161 of the 2014 constition allows a supermajority of two thirds of parliament to call for a public referendum to end the president's term and organise early presidential elections. 

Elyazal openly seeks to limit such powers, telling Reuters that in a year or two "we will see" what really needs to be amended in the constitution. 

Gad on the other hand fears that the seeds of a new "authoritarian" party will be planted "underneath the dome", which threatens the democratic transition in Egypt.

It appears that with such differences in approach, even within what seems to be the strongest coalition so far, to borrow the words of Nathan Brown, "The 2015 parliament may occasion the introduction of cat-herding metaphors into the Egyptian dialect."

(Additional reporting by Viola Fahmy)