Getting to know political veteran, Bahaaeddin Abu Shoka

CAIRO - 2 April 2018: Descending from a family of lawyers and legal experts, newly-elected chairperson of Al-Wafd party, Bahaaeddin Abu Shoka successfully saved his position as one of the most important politicians and legal figures in Egypt. Starting his early life as a judge, Abu Shoka continues to play an effective political role in the country.

Abu Shoka is a lawyer and politician. He studied in the faculty of Law at Cairo University and graduated in 1959. He was appointed as Deputy Attorney General in the Northern Cairo Prosecution from 1959 - 1968. In 1975, he chose to resign; then he started working as a lawyer and he went on to become one of the most successful lawyers in Egypt.

His advocacy office took on a number of well-known lawsuits that affected public opinion in Egypt. Furthermore, following the January 25 Revolution that toppled former President Hosni Mubarak, Abu Shoka was asked to be part of Mubarak’s defense team in the lawsuits filed against him. However, according to his statements, he refused. In mid-June 2012, he was named as a member of the Constituent Assembly of Egypt that created the country’s new constitution.

Abu Shoka was appointed twice as a member of Egypt’s Shura Council in 2010 and 2012 until it was dissolved in 2013. After the June 2013 revolution that toppled the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliated President Mohamed Morsi, Abu Shoka headed the Parliament's first session.

Although Abu Shoka was extremely inspired and affected by his family of well-known lawyers, politics was not his only concern. Abu Shoka was known for his writings, serials, and television and radio programs as he received the State Award in literature in 1961.

In a previous interview with Egypt Today, Abu Shoka announced his support for President Abdel Fatah al Sisi. "I support President Sisi to run for a second presidential term and the majority of parliamentarians stand behind Sisi."

On March 31, Bahaaeddin Abu Shoka was elected as the new chairman of the Wafd Party in the election held at the party’s headquarters in Cairo. With a voter turnout of about 2,500, Abu Shoka won the chairmanship with 1,300 votes, while his closest competitor, Hossam al-Kholi, obtained only 900 votes.

On the same day of naming him as the political party’s new chairman, Abu Shoka announced that Al-Wafd party will nominate one of its members for Egypt’s 2022 presidential election.

“The supreme body of the Wafd Party took a binding decision by nominating a candidate in the 2022 presidential election,” Parliamentarian Sulaiman Wahdan, House of Representatives speaker deputy, told CBC Extra channel. “Any political party has to have a candidate to seek power,” he added.

Al Wafd Party used to be one of Egypt’s most influential political parties for a period of time, especially from the end of World War I through the 1930s. Most of the party’s leaders used to be very effective members in the Egyptian society, including former Prime Minister Saad Zaghloul who led the revolution of 1919 against the British colonization of Egypt.