The Arabist

The Arabist

By Issandr El Amrani and friends.

Gamal getting married after all

So it seems that the Gamal and Khadiga story was true after all:

CAIRO (Reuters) - The son of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, ruling party politician Gamal Mubarak, will get engaged on Friday to the daughter of a prominent building contractor, the state-owned newspaper al-Ahram said on Sunday.

Gamal, 42, is the assistant secretary general of Mubarak's National Democratic Party (NDP) and the head of the policies section. The opposition says the NDP is preparing him to succeed his father but Gamal says he has no presidential ambitions.

Al-Ahram said his fiancee is the daughter of contractor Mahmoud Yahya el-Gammal. The independent newspaper Al Masry Al Yom named her as Khadiga, born in 1982 and a graduate of the American University in Cairo, where Gamal studied in the 1980s.

Asked in a recent interview when he planned to get married, Gamal said he would do so when he met the right person.

Gamal Mubarak's office had no immediate comment on the reports.
Remember you heard it here first.

Incidentally we've learned recently that Gamal acolyte Muhammad Kamal, the spokesman and electoral architect of the NDP, recently got engaged. Maybe it will be a double wedding.