15 - 21 March 2001
Issue No.525
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Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 15 - 21 March 2001 Issue No.525 |
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Changing the guard
For Egypt's Coptic community, religion and politics walk hand in hand -- but should they? Nadia Abou El-Magd raises the curtain on Saturday's Coptic Community Council elections
Heated debate over the role of Egypt's Al-Maglis Al-Melli, or Coptic Community Council, have accompanied the run-up to this year's council elections, which will be held on Saturday, 17 March. Many Coptic leaders want to see an enlarged political role for the council, but others counter that the political sphere is best left to politicians.
There are 45 candidates running for the council's 24 seats. A secular body of prominent Coptic figures, the council was first established in 1874 to oversee the affairs of the Coptic community and manage church endowments. The council's activities came to a virtual freeze in 1956, but were revived in the 1970s. The hiatus, however, degraded its clout in socio-political affairs. The last elections were held in October 1995, under the leadership of Pope Shenouda III, head of the Coptic Orthodox Church.
Council elections have been plagued in the past by low voter turnout and many blame the strict conditions for voter registration. Under the council's statutes, voters must be over 25 years old and have either a university degree or be registered as a businessman or land owners. These pre-conditions are dismissed by some detractors as "unconstitutional" and blamed, along with the apathy of many Copts, for poor turnout. Only 4,000 Copts are currently registered to vote.
But weeding out young and less educated voters is not the only concern of those demanding change. One notable campaign has been the call for judicial supervision over the upcoming elections -- a cause championed by Coptic affairs expert Kamal Zakher Moussa. Moussa has even proposed that the council's name be changed so as not to include the melli (community) epithet, saying that it was appropriate for the 19th century, but not for the 21st. The main issue, however, remains the administration of the church's revenues, says Moussa. "It is unbelievable that we leave millions of dollars unaccounted for," he said. "We have to protect these revenues."
Internal regulations stipulate that the patriarch (pope) is the de facto head of the council -- the body exists to support him in secular affairs -- but he is not accountable for the council's actions. Considered by many to be an unofficial "Coptic parliament," the council is not actually supposed to play any political role. But many believe it should.
Attorney Mamdouh Nakhla, 38, has nominated himself for the upcoming elections in an effort to "defend the concerns of Copts." As director of the Word Centre for Human Rights, Nakhla's list of concerns are a bundle of politically charged issues aimed at eradicating discrimination between Muslims and Copts. He wants a decree requiring the president's permission to build or repair any church thrown out and he wants the religion category wiped off identity cards. He wants Coptic history taught in schools, Coptic Sunday mass broadcast live on television, and Coptic holidays made national ones.
"These are largely political demands -- and I mean them to be," Nakhla told Al-Ahram Weekly. "The council should play a political role." Last month, Nakhla's human rights centre issued a strongly-worded statement objecting to the controversial verdict last month in the Al-Kosheh case, which many Copts, including Pope Shenouda, considered to be unacceptably lenient. The incident early last year saw the eruption of rioting and sectarian violence in the Upper Egyptian village of Al-Kosheh and left 20 Copts and one Muslim dead. Of the 96 defendants in the case, only four received jail terms and the rest were acquitted. The state prosecution has already contested the verdicts.
Youssef Seidhom, a member of the outgoing council and chief editor of the Coptic weekly Watani, said he is running for "voluntary, not political" reasons, and insists that political issues are for the community as a whole, not just for Copts. The assumption that the council should "defend Copts in dealings with the state," he said, is a misconception.
"Copts are Egyptians, who are not -- and should not be -- represented by the Church or the Melli council in dealings with the state," he said, claiming that Copts and Muslims are equal citizens. Any problem should be tackled as a societal, and not an ethnic or religious, problem. "We have to struggle to establish this belief and understanding."
Seidhom downplayed the criticism that low voter turnout results from a list of candidates favoured by Pope Shenouda. "Like in any other elections, there are sore losers," he said.
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