Cairo - Gamal Mubarak, the younger son of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, cast himself as a defender of the poor on Sunday in a speech seen by many as an attempt to hone his prospects of succeeding his father.
The 45-year-old former investment banker heads the powerful policy committee in the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) and is widely tipped as the next president, although he has never admitted having presidential aspirations.
Addressing the party convention a day after his father pledged a "clean and free" presidential election in 2011, Mubarak held forth for more than an hour on the NDP's aims in what resembled a stump speech and attacked the opposition as contrarians without any programmes.
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He detailed the party's social and economic programmes and said it will step up efforts to explain its policies to Egyptians.
The NDP "will especially pay attention to the poor, orphans and widows and women", he said.
Despite rampant speculation about his candidacy, Gamal Mubarak left out any mention of whether he would contest the elections, in keeping with his customary silence on the matter.
At a news conference later, he seemed irritated when several journalists asked him whether he would run for president and ducked the questions before saying the elections were still far off.
His father, who is 81, has been Egypt's leader for 28 years but has yet to say whether he will stand again or whether he would support Gamal as a candidate.
Two ministers, including Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, have said recently that Gamal Mubarak is a possible candidate, the closest senior officials have come to suggesting that he would run.
Speculation on the succession and the chattering class's preoccupation with the subject have increased in the wake of such comments and of reports, denied by the NDP, that it was conducting a poll on Mubarak junior's popularity.
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