Ikhwan Political Platform in The Eyes of Young Brothers

 The preliminary draft of the Muslim Brotherhood Party platform triggered mixed reactions and criticism from politicians and intellectuals and some members of the group itself.

The group had presented about 50 intellectuals with the draft of the program to get their viewpoints before issuing the program’s final version. But, it was faced with sharp criticism. Ikhwanweb explored the opinion of the MB youth to get their views about the platform.

Magdy Saad, a young member of the Brotherhood and the blogger of “Ok! It is not important” considers one of the most positive aspects in the draft is the adoption of the modern democratic and parliamentary system, which he sees as a credit to the Islamic movement in Egypt as a whole, which will influence other Islamic movements in the region..

“The other positive point is related to the technocrats who used to accuse the Islamists of having broad frames and vague slogans as well as inability to touch on the real economic and social problems of the society.

The party programme overcome this point by spelling out the problems and the many demands of the society and suggested solutions to a great number of them”.

Aya Khalid, another Ikhwan blogger owner of “I like the light” blog seconded him. She asserted that adopting democracy is one of the most important merits saying:
“the idea of presenting the draft programme of the brotherhood party before presenting the final version of the programme manifests great flexibility. The programme is amendable according to the preliminary reaction”.  

Aya cited several positive points in the draft. The programme adopted well known concepts applicable worldwide and linked them to their Islamic origin from the very beginning such as Shura, democracy and citizenship to be used as the principles of this Islamic party.

The idea of freedom to set up independent institutions such as student federations or different syndicates were among the positive points mentioned. The programme also adopted the slogan of independent general administration away from the hegemony and total authority of the ruling party. This is something that Egypt lakes at present.

Aya added that among the basic points that won her admiration in the party “s programme was the setting of the nature of relations between Muslims and Copts in a clear and fair way, saying that it gave no way for doubts or concerns over this point.

Aya said that but there were some minor demits such as the lack of clarity in some goals when discussing the programme, adding that they should have been termed as “vision” rather than goals which should be more accurate”.

Amal Ghonaim, owner of “Esrar” (determination), who is not a member of the Brotherhood, but she said that she should express her opining regarding all issues. She thought that the idea of a brother”s party is possible in general, adding that “if the brotherhood party managed to realize the equation of working in the spiritual and political sides in parallel line so that no side should overwhelm the other and thus she would support such a party. But in the current stage, I do not think that the people are ready to accept this party. They do not accept the success of Islamists similar to that of other countries. The success of Islamists in Jordan, for instance, could not be compared to that of Egypt”.

Sherouk Al Shawaf, Secretary General of the Free Federation at Helwan University and owner of the blog “The best in this world” said that the defect in the presentation of the brothers” party is the lack of media propaganda for such an event. There was no conference or any media coverage.

On the other hand, the draft was not confined to intellectuals for expressing opinion. The brothers have not managed to make the draft a private issue as they wanted. They have not managed, at the same time, to make an open official announcement for the public and thus it was difficult to get it even by the Ikhwan members themselves.

Sherouk pointed out that among the defects, she sees, is that the founders of this programme are not identified.

The Shura Council of the Brotherhood might be the creator of the programme but where as the opinion of the Brothers” intellectuals and leaders. The issue is really vague for us!

It is worth noting that Dr. Gamal Heshmat has told Islamonline website that he has not read the programme before hand and no one discussed it with him.

Criticizing the content of the programme itself, she said that the choice of words was not careful and had backfired, adding that sometimes the words were not clear.

Sherouk talked about the issue of presidential nominations, which had received much criticism, saying: “of course, we are in an Islamic country and so only a Muslim can assume the presidency however this point should have been formulated in a better way. We are in the world of politics and no mistakes should be made in expression”.

She thought that the right to nomination should be entitled to every one but the issue of who should ultimately win. We are in a Muslim country that respects citizenship rights.

Among the passive points in the programme “Magdy Saad” said that he thought that non-politicians inside the group have interfered in the make-up of the programme whether being in the formation or the introduction of some items and thus the programme was not flowing harmoniously.

There are some paragraphs inserted to satisfy some intellectual trends. Thus, there were contradictory decisions due interferences from the part of those who know nothing about the state system or the society in Egypt.

He sited the supreme scholars” council, which he considered “irrelevant” to the programme.

On the other passive points, he said that among the problems that face the group in Egypt till date is that it considers itself the “Mother Group” for all Islamic groups worldwide. This has affected its decisions and the special situation in Egypt.
He cited Kuwait”s brothers who decided to deny women the right to vote, he added that this decision was rejected by brothers outside Kuwait. But the decision went on because it was the internal affairs of each state.

As for Egypt, the interference came without realizing the real internal situation in Egypt and lacking consideration of its own conditions. For example the issue of nomination (to presidency) which excluded women and Copts in Egypt was mistakenly formulated.

“There is clear Coptic discontent in Egypt and women are strongly defending their rights. We could not ignore this issue under the pretext that Egypt was the pioneer and should set the example and do not allow the minority to nomination (to presidency).

Concluding, Magdy Saad said, “the angry reaction of some intellectual and Brother leaders should be an alarm that something was wrong about some of the items of the programme. I wish that the programme would be amended, although that some are dealing with the situation from an ideological stand and thus the group could fall apart when amending the programme according to their views.