Egypt’s most powerful political force, the Muslim Brotherhood, may be splintering.
The influence of the Islamist group has raised fears in the West and among some secular and liberal groups in Egypt that the democratic path here may end with an Islamic state. But the historically unified movement, long considered the only viable opposition to Hosni Mubarak, has struggled to adapt to the new political landscape.
Just three months before parliamentary elections, the group is facing dissension within its ranks, as reformers push for a more open system of choosing leaders and political candidates.
The Brotherhood’s leadership appeared to be dragged reluctantly into the mass protests that forced Mubarak from the presidency, and the young members who joined the uprising say the group is still too slow to react to the sentiments of the Egyptian masses.
Some within the movement who have been calling for change are slowly splitting off from the organisation’s sanctioned Freedom and Justice Party and forming their own parties. The result could splinter the Muslim Brotherhood’s voter base and weaken its representation in the next parliament.
So far, just four new parties are being formed and Brotherhood members dismiss them as insignificant. But the cracks in the Brotherhood’s usually monolithic structure suggest the movement may be unravelling.
“The splintering shows the strains that the revolution has put on the Brotherhood,” said Elijah Zarwan, an Egypt expert from the International Crisis Group.
The group has retaliated against the breakaway forces, and this week expelled five youth members from the larger social and religious organisation for forming a new party, according to Islam Lotfy, who said he was among those who were thrown out. The expulsions were widely reported, but a Muslim Brotherhood spokesman, Mahmoud Ghozlan, said this week that they were still under review.
Last month, the leadership of the Brotherhood expelled Abdel Moneim Abou el Fatouh, a leading reformer and the respected head of the Arab Medical Union, for putting himself forward as a presidential candidate. The Brotherhood has said it plans to field candidates for 30 to 50 percent of parliamentary seats. But, in acknowledgment of concerns that it could wield too much power in a post-Mubarak Egypt, the movement’s leaders have said they do not seek to rule the country and will not field a candidate for president.
Lotfy, 33, a lawyer, was part of the youth coalition that helped drive the Egyptian revolution in January. He said his new party, the Egyptian Current, would be more diverse and promote a democratic government, though he stopped short of saying it was secular.
He called his expulsion “aggressive” and warned that the Brotherhood would lose more support if it isolated itself from the new realities of Egypt.
“Maybe the leaders are scared of this new era of freedom because they aren’t used to it,” he said.
“They’re used to living under persecution.”
During Mubarak’s nearly 30-year rule, the group was technically banned and its members were persecuted and arrested. Still, it was allowed to exist on a tight leash and in 2005 won about one-fifth of the seats in parliament with candidates who ran as independents. The organisation was late to sanction protests against Mubarak and has been criticised for now trying to co-opt the revolution that went forward without it.
While the Brotherhood doctrine seeks to create a state governed by its strict interpretation of Islamic law, the group rejects militant violence to achieve its goals and is considered too mainstream by extremist groups such as al-Qaeda.
“The context changed too fast for them to adapt,” said Ibrahim Houdaiby, a former Brotherhood member and analyst.
“They are losing people, but we have to wait and see how that will impact on the group at large.”
Already the Brotherhood’s political party has softened its stance on issues such as whether women and Coptic Christians can run for president.
On the group’s website, a statement from the deputy of the political party, Essam el Erian, says any Egyptian citizen has the right to run for president. The Brotherhood also announced in June a formidable electoral alliance with the country’s most historic liberal and secular party, Wafd, despite their ideological differences.
Since Mubarak’s ouster, the group has not officially participated in any popular protests against the conduct of Egypt’s interim military leadership, prompting charges that the Brotherhood is too close to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces. That pattern was broken this week, however, with the Brotherhood’s endorsement of a planned protest on Friday against the slow pace of change in the country.
Some younger members of the Brotherhood have been striking out on their own since the organisation failed to back the early anti-Mubarak protests. “We are trying to do what we did during the revolution, where we put aside affiliation and ideology and worked in the interest of Egypt,” Lotfy said.
Estimates of the number of Brotherhood members who have split off to form new political groups vary, from 200 to 2 000.
Brotherhood officials dismiss the splinter groups as unimportant when compared with their estimated 600 000 members and millions of supporters nationwide, and no one disputes that the group’s decades-long head start in organising makes it Egypt’s most potent political force.
“People have the right to express their opinions freely, but they have commitments with the Muslim Brotherhood,” said Mamdouh Ismail, a lawyer and member of the group. Members of the Brotherhood who want to be involved in politics should follow through on this commitment and join the party connected to the organisation, he said.
But he insisted the splits would not affect the Muslim Brotherhood’s popular base. “Not one centimetre,” he said. – Washington Post-Bloomberg