EIPR expresses its concern regarding the Religious Committee of the House of Representatives approval in principle, on the twentieth of last month, of a bill to amend some articles of the law regulating religious preaching and lessons. The proposed amendments expanded the scope of the law to also include the prohibition of “talking about religious matters on visual, audio or Electronic media” except with an official license from Al-Azhar or Ministry of Endowments, and increases penalties for violating the law, in some cases, amounting to life imprisonment with hard labor.
 

EIPR calls on the House of Representatives to withdraw the draft law amendment, submitted by Representative Tariq Radwan and 60 other deputies, and warns that the amendments open the door to more persecutions and trials for diverse religious expression and criticism of prevailing religious ideas. These amendments would be a severe addition to Article 98 and of the Penal Code (Contempt of Religion Article) and articles 25 and 27 of the Law on Combating Information Technology Crimes issued in 2018, which punish “misuse of social media.” It is according to those articles that a number of writers, bloggers and opinion holders are prosecuted, the most recent of whom was media figure Ibrahim Issa, where the Public Prosecution investigated him for accusations of broadcasting a religious opinion contrary to the prevailing Sunni Islamic doctrine in a television program.
 

The draft amendments include the addition of a phrase stipulating the punishment of “anyone who expresses an opinion contrary to established religion, or contrary to its origins or overall accepted principles, if that opinion results in spreading discord (Fitna)or inciting violence among the people of the nation” with imprisonment for a period of up to one year and a fine of up to 100,000 pounds, "doubled in the case of recidivism, and amounting to life imprisonment with hard labor."

EIPR stresses that this proposal increases the threat to all those with religious views that differ from what is adopted by official religious institutions and is described as “the true religion.” It also adds a broad and undefined expression such as “spreading discord (Fitna)” which the text of the law places in the same context with “incitement to violence” without clarification and in a very dangerous confusion, either of them entailing the possibility of increasing the penalty to life with hard labor for peaceful expression of opinion, which is an unprecedented punishment in religious legislation or penalties related to publication and media.
 

The amendments also include an increase in the minimum penalty and an increase in the minimum and maximum fines related to public preaching and speaking of religious matters, or wearing the Azhar dress for non-Azharites or those licensed to preach and advise from Al-Azhar and the Ministry of Endowments.

EIPR had expressed its concern at the time of the issuance of law No. 51 of 2014. currently in force to regulate public discourse, decreed by Adly Mansour, the former President of the Republic in the transitional period. EIPR also stressed that policies and laws regulating the religious sphere should be biased towards freedom of religion and belief and its expression individually or collectively, without prejudice to other rights and freedoms, or including incitement to violence or discrimination against members of another religion or belief. EIPR repeated that the state’s role is to set policies to hold accountable and confront the call for religious discrimination and sectarian incitement, not to restrict religious expression and discussion of religious affairs or expressing an opinion and not allow their monopoly by an official religious institution according to a specific doctrine; and that religious diversity in beliefs, opinions, doctrines, tendencies and jurisprudence is the basis that the state, according to the constitution, must guarantee and protect.

Th following table shows the proposed amendments approved in principle by the House of Representatives’ Religious Committee: