Leaders of Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church have split over which candidate the church should support in the presidential election slated for 23 and 24 May.
Last week, 22 bishops held a meeting at the office of Pope Shenouda III to review the platforms of presidential hopefuls Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh and Amr Moussa. The meeting ended with 12 bishops agreeing to back Abouel Fotouh.
There is no precise breakdown of how many Christians live in the Egypt, because past governments have refused to announce numbers. Unofficial estimates say that Christians, mostly Copts, make up about 10 percent of Egypt’s 85 million people.
During Mubarak, Copts were seen as a contingency that could propel a specific candidate to Parliament, but their real electoral power is unknown.
Sources told independent daily Al-Shorouk newspaper on Monday that the rest of the bishops at the meeting declined to support Abouel Fotouh because of his background as a former Muslim Brotherhood member.
Abouel Fotouh officially left the Brotherhood after the group decided not to make a bid for the presidency. He is considered to be a moderate Islamist who has expressed his full support of freedom of faith. In a TV show last year, he said: “Nobody should interfere if a Christian decides to convert to Islam or a Muslim decides to leave Islam and become Christian.”
He has expressed his support of a Copt’s right to run for president.
Traditionally, the Coptic Church aligned itself with Mubarak, pledging absolute support during his three decades in office.
According to Al-Shorouk, the debate within the church also stems from the under-representation of Copts in the panel that will be drafting the country’s new constitution. The church has, for now, only nominated Anba Moussa, its youth affairs bishop, but is also pushing for fielding other members.
Under the Constitutional Declaration, Parliament is responsible for picking the 100-strong assembly that will write the new constitution.
Parliament has said it will discuss the criteria for selecting constituent assembly members 17 March. The election of the panel’s members will begin on 23 March.
In recent weeks, People’s Assembly members have set forth various proposals for what the constitutional assembly should look like.
Liberal, secular and Coptic leaders have said they fear Islamist groups, which occupy a majority of Parliament’s seats, could dominate the constitution-making process by giving Parliament members a larger share of seats in the assembly.
