Purists and moderates jostle for power

Young adherents of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood are resisting control from older, hard-line leaders. Photo / AP

The night breeze blew foul wafts from a nearby canal black with garbage. The streets, jammed with trucks and rickshaws, were so shattered they hardly seemed paved at all.

It was to Cairo's slum of Munib on a recent evening that the Muslim Brotherhood, Egypt's biggest Islamic group, brought its election campaign message: the country must turn to Islam to rebuild.

"Muslims around the world expect great things from you," Essam el-Erian, deputy head of the Brotherhood's new political party, told supporters crowded into a tent, with men across the aisle from women, who wore headscarves or black veils. "We have to build a nation of freedom and equality, a nation of the true Islam."

The scene was inconceivable before President Hosni Mubarak's February 11 removal from power.

Under Mubarak's autocratic regime, the Brotherhood was banned. Tens of thousands of its members were arrested, many tortured and its gatherings were held largely in secret. Now the Brotherhood is storming into the open, appealing to religious voters and trying to win over Egypt's poor. It is likely to be part of Egypt's next government, with a hand not only in ruling but also in writing a new constitution. Its strength has fuelled fears among many Egyptians that it will turn what began as a pro-democracy uprising in the most populous Arab nation into Islamic rule.

The Brotherhood's own identity is on the line as well. Internally, Brotherhood moderates - many from a younger generation - are resisting control from hard-line leaders, in a struggle that could fragment the group. From the outside, a budding democracy is pushing the Brotherhood, at least in public, to present a more liberal face.

How the Brotherhood deals with its new status will be a major test of whether Islamic purists and democracy can be compatible in the aftermath of the Middle East's wave of revolutions. With the Brotherhood involved in protests in Syria, Yemen, Libya and Jordan, the answer here could be a model across the region.

"We're not ready for power, we don't have the flexibility," said Mohammed Osman, a 29-year-old pharmacist who counts himself among the Brotherhood's new generation. "To go from prison to power, that could be extremely dangerous."

In one of Cairo's most prominent mosques, the Brotherhood's top leader, Mohammed Badie, paused during the sermon-campaign speech he was delivering, marking the direction of Islam's holy city of Mecca. A child next to him, with a green Brotherhood sash across his chest, took the cue to break in with a chant.

"God is great," the boy piped up. The crowd of more than 1000 men, seated on the carpets of the Amr ibn al-As Mosque, echoed back: "God is great, God is great."

"Egypt's revolution was produced by none other than God Almighty," Badie resumed. "The days of 'no religion in politics and no politics in religion' ended long ago."

The image recalls the nightmares Mubarak's regime often evoked. Without Mubarak's iron grip, his officials warned, the Brotherhood would seize power through the mosque. Women would be forced to wear the headscarf, clerics would hand out punishments such as amputations for thieves and whippings for adulterers, and Egypt's large Christian minority would be consigned to second-class status.

It is an image the Brotherhood is trying to shed as it adapts to the demands of a democratic system.

Now Brotherhood officials on talk shows are questioned on whether they will ban alcohol or implement Islamic punishments. Their answer: it is not the time. The time may never come, they say, and if it does it will only be with voters' consent.

In a draft, the party's vision for a new constitution mirrors that of most liberals, a parliamentary system with limited powers for the president and guarantees of personal freedoms, a radical change to ensure no irremovable "pharaoh" like Mubarak can rule. Absent are past Brotherhood ideas, such as a panel of clerics to advise the government.

"We are for freedom of expression for all, even if it's a communist, a leftist or a secularist," says Aly Khafagy, a 29-year-old party organiser. "Ultimately, the street is the one that rules. If the street is the one that can put us in, it can also put us out."

And "the Islamic basis?" Khafagy depicts it as a democracy that "respects Islamic values", in the vein of United States conservatives who talk of America's "Judeo-Christian heritage". But from others it sounds far stronger.

"The Brotherhood won't stop and won't be silent and won't accept anything but the complete implementation of Islamic shariah law," said Sobhi Saleh, a former Parliament member and now one of the Brotherhood's most active campaigners, at a rally. At another rally weeks later, he proclaimed the Brotherhood "doesn't recognise liberal Muslims or secular Muslims" and vowed that the next government "God willing, will be Islamist".

The comments raised an uproar. Even some Brotherhood leaders distanced themselves. Opponents warned this was the true Brotherhood - intolerant, convinced it alone represents Islam.

For Mohammad Osman, the pharmacist, Tahrir Square during the days of the anti-Mubarak uprising was a "Utopia". He and other young Brothers were in the square alongside liberal and secular protesters, in what he calls the spirit of openness of the new Brotherhood generation.

It is in contrast to the older Brotherhood leaders. Their attitude is typified in the group's central tenet, "Listen and obey": once leaders make a decision, members have a near-religious duty to follow.

The rifts within the Brotherhood point to troubles in keeping together a movement that covers a range of Islamic ideologies, from the moderate to the deeply conservative. The tighter the leaders try to control, the more moderates filter away. That could hurt the movement's broader public support.

Under Mubarak, unity was considered necessary for a movement under constant threat. As a result, the Brotherhood has been like a tribe.

"These are your colleagues, you study with them, you work with them, you get arrested with them. You marry from among them," says Osman, a Brother since high school.

It cannot work that way in politics.

Osman worries election victory could bring out the worst in the Brotherhood: a domineering side. Already, he says, the group's leadership is trying overly to control its own party: "It's as if they are pushing us to leave the Brotherhood. But I can't do that. I want to remain a voice of conscience within the movement."

Despite pledges of independence, the Brotherhood has appointed the three top officers of its Freedom and Justice Party from within its own echelons. The group also prohibits Brothers from taking part in any other political party.

For Osman and some in the new generation, it felt too much like the old ways. They have decided not to participate actively in the party. A few have broken to join competing parties, or are trying to influence the party from within.

Osman's ultimate concern is that the Brotherhood's old mindset could wreck chances for a broad-based government Egypt needs. Some Brotherhood leaders have spoken of an alliance with Egypt's most ultraconservative movement, the Salafis.

The only guide to the Brotherhood's polling strength is from 2005, when it won 20 per cent of Parliament despite ruling party rigging. The assumption is it would do better in a fair race.

But after the revolution that is far from certain, argues columnist Wael Abdel-Fattah. The Brotherhood has lost "the glamour of oppression and the protest vote", he says.

It may come down to Egypt's silent majority. "The vast majority of the population, say 70 per cent, have nothing to do with Islamists and nothing to do with secularists," Osman says.

"Whoever wins them will be the ones who rule Egypt."

New party sits in prime position for elections

As Egypt races towards its first free parliamentary elections, planned for September, the Brotherhood's power in the new Egypt comes down to a raw count: how many seats it wins.

In this country of 80 million, Egyptians are expected to vote in unprecedented numbers. Their preferences have never been measured before.

The 90-year-old Brotherhood, with its hundreds of thousands of activists, has a leg up on more secular activists scrambling to form parties. For the first time, it has formed a political party, holding rallies nationwide.

It has revved up social services that long helped build its following. In Alexandria, young Brothers clean streets and fill potholes. In Kafr Mit Fatek, a tiny Nile Delta farming village, a travelling clinic of Brotherhood doctors gives families free dental work and gynaecological exams.

The group has opened a Cairo headquarters in a luxury office building proudly emblazoned with its emblem, crossed swords under a Koran with the word "Prepare".

Brotherhood leaders say the new Freedom and Justice Party will run for only half of Parliament's seats so it cannot gain a majority. Nor will it field a candidate in November's presidential election.

- AP