The 'no to religious parties' campaign gains momentum
Egypt's Ministry of Endowments announced on Wednesday that it supports a
campaign aimed at preventing religious parties from contesting the upcoming
parliamentary elections
Gamal Essam El-Din , Wednesday 26 Aug 2015
http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/138915/Egypt/Politics-/The-no-to-religious-parties-campaign-gains-momentu.aspx

Egypt's Ministry of Endowments supports a campaign entitled "no to religious
parties," it said in an official statement on Wednesday.

According to Sabry Ebada, deputy of the endowments minister in Alexandria,
"the ministry strongly supports 'the no to religious parties' campaign and
hopes that the campaign will extend to cover all of Egypt's governorates
because political parties based on religious foundations only lead to
discrimination among citizens on sectarian grounds."

Ebada added, "a Muslim nation like Egypt should not discriminate among
Muslims and non-Muslims and should act in the interest of the civil, social,
economic and political rights for all of its citizens without religious or
class leanings."

He also argued that "political parties are the ones who are established to
serve all citizens without discrimination on religious grounds."

On Tuesday, Mohamed Abdel-Razeq, chairman of the endowments ministry's
religious sector, also announced that article 74 of the new constitution
clearly states that political parties based on religious foundations are
strictly banned.

"As a result, we support any campaign aimed at implementing this
constitutional principle," Abdel-Razeq said in an interview with Al-Ahram
newspaper.

Abdel-Razeq also stressed that the Ministry of Endowments would fully
exercise its power to ensure that candidates in the coming parliamentary
elections do not raise religious slogans or use places of worship – mosques
or churches – for election campaigns.

"The endowments ministry would also make sure that religious clerics who aim
to run in the coming parliamentary elections would be prevented from
delivering sermons at Friday prayers or delivering religious lectures in
mosques throughout the election period," Abdel-Razeq said.

For a while after the 2011 uprising, when the Islamists took over the
political scene, it was common for political arms of Islamist groups to use
mosques for political purposes.

Abdel-Razeq added that "the ministry would do its best to ensure that there
is a separation between religion and politics in mosques and Al-Azhar
schools and institutes."

According to Abdel-Razeq, "the one year rule of the Muslim Brotherhood
(2012-2013) led to the proliferation of radical clerics involved in mixing
religion with politics and discriminating among citizens on religious
grounds. We will do our best to relieve the nation of this bad heritage."

'The no to religious parties' campaign was launched two weeks ago by Tamarod
(rebel) and political activist Hamdi Al-Fakharani.

Tamarod was a signature drive that played a leading role in ousting former
Islamist president Mohamed Morsi from office in July 2013.

Tamarod claimed that it collected around 22 million signatures in favour of
removing Morsi from office and appointing chairman of the Supreme
Constitutional Court as interim president.

According to Doaa Khalifa, the member of Tamarod in charge of collecting
signatures for "the no to religious parties", who spoke at the Journalists
Syndicate on Friday, the group aims to collect 23 million signatures from
ordinary citizens in favour of the campaign.

Nour Party under fire

Khalifa said the campaign mainly aims at imposing a ban on the
ultraconservative Salafist Nour campaign ahead of parliamentary elections.

"I think everyone in this country knows quite well that Nour [party] is a
religious party and that its ideology stands on discrimination among
citizens on religious and sectarian grounds and as a result it should not be
allowed to exercise any political activities," Khalifa said.

He also insisted "the campaign has been able in one week to collect more
than 100,000 signatures from citizens from six different governorates."

Khalifa said on Wednesday that the endowments ministry's support of the
campaign and its decision to prevent the Salafist clerics from Nour from
delivering sermons in different mosques is a success for the campaign.

Al-Fakharani, a former MP who is a harsh critic of the Muslim Brotherhood,
said he fully supports Tamarod's campaign.

"The Nour Party espouses the same ideology as the Muslim Brotherhood and all
other extremist Islamist jihadist organisations like Daesh (ISIS) and it is
very bad for political life in Egypt that members of this party could gain
seats in parliament," said Al-Fakharani.

He also indicated "the signatures in favor of dissolving religious parties
like Nour will be used to go to the court to ask for eliminating this party
and others officially."

The campaign also gained support from former judges such as Ahmed
Abdel-Rahman who was deputy chairman of the State Council and chairman of
the political parties committee that was in charge of licensing political
parties under the former Mubarak regime.

Abdel-Rahman said "the no to religious parties" campaign reflects a sweeping
popular will."

"The revolt of the Egyptian people in 2013 was not only against Mohamed
Morsi or the Muslim Brotherhood but against all religious parties and for
their mixing religion with politics," Abdel-Rahman said.

However, Abdel-Rahman said "it is deplorable that no political institution
has taken any serious step towards dissolving Nour and as a result the
campaign comes to reflect the necessity of implementing article 74 of the
constitution."

Nour is the only potent Islamist political party that supported the ouster
of Morsi. It was excluded from the security crackdown on pro-Morsi Islamists
that saw the Freedom and Justice Party of the Muslim Brotherhood dismantled.

The Tamarod campaign gained support from leftist political parties such as
Tagammu that has been a fierce critic of Muslim Brotherhood.

Rifaat Al-Said, the former chairman of Tagammu, said "the no to religious
parties" is a step towards implementing article 74 of the constitution.

"The next step should include going to the political parties committee and
administrative courts to ask for the dissolution of Nour and other religious
parties," Al-Said said.

Osama Al-Ghazali Harb, a political analyst and a leading member of the Free
Egyptians Party, said "the Egyptian people did not expel the Muslim
Brotherhood from the door, only to see another religious party like Nour to
come from the window."

But other political analysts, like Al-Ahram's Amr Hashem Rabie, were
critical of Tamarod's campaign.

Rabie said Nour was part of the revolution against Morsi and its leaders
never said they have a religious party.

Rabie believes that the wide popularity of Nour in Egyptian governorates
represents the real motive behind the Tamarod campaign.

"Instead of competing against this party in fair elections, the Tamarod and
other secular parties resort to courts to eliminate the party and gain seats
without competition," said Rabie.

Shaaban Abdel-Alim, a leading Nour official, told Ahram Online that
"Tamarod" itself is an illegal entity trying to impose its say on the
political street.

"We are not a religious party. We are just a political party with a
religious background," said Abdel-Alim, adding that "if Nour was dissolved
in any way, the party's leaders would meet to form another party under a
different name."

Abdel-Alim agrees that some secular forces aim to dominate the coming
parliament without competition.

"They want to achieve this without facing any competition and by seizing on
the wide animosity against the Muslim Brotherhood to obliterate all moderate
Islamic forces from the political arena," Abdel-Alim said.