Egyptian Baha’is must have in hand the new National ID Card before the deadline of 31 December 2006, on which all Egyptian citizens must carry the new ID Card at all times. The application form requires the applicant to state his or her religion. It also requires the applicant to declare “that all details in this application are correct and real; I accept responsibility for consequences, with the full knowledge that providing any incorrect information in this application is considered forgery of official documents and is legally punishable according to the articles of the penal code”. This, of course, places the Baha’is in an untenable situation, since they have been told explicitly by government officials that they are not permitted to hold identification in which the space for religion specifies “other” and that they must “choose one of the three religions”
1) This case is not about the Egyptian government’s accepting the divine origin of the Bahá’í Faith.
2) It is, rather, about how Egyptian Bahá’ís, who are under the same obligation as all other Egyptian citizens to obtain government-issued identification cards, can do so without being falsely identified on these documents.
3) The government has an application form for the identity card in which a person has to state his or her religion. That same application form requires the applicant to declare “that all details in this application are correct and real; I accept responsibility for consequences, with the full knowledge that providing any incorrect information in this application is considered forgery of official documents and is legally punishable according to the articles of the penal code.”
Continue reading the informative blog entry, which fully exposes the situation.
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NabilE
11 July, 2007
As you indicate in this article, the case of the Baha’is in Egypt focuses on the denial of Egyptian citizens of their civil and human rights as citizens of that country. Unfortunately the government and the supreme administrative court have decided to attack the Baha’i Faith as “not divine” and “not true” instead of dealing with the issue of human and civil rights. Theological arguments are for theologians and are not matters of civil and human rights. Jews have denied the divinity of Christ and the prophet Muhammed (PBUT). Christians have denied the divinity of the Prophet Muhammed (PBUH). Majority Christian countries have not legally denied the human and civil rights of Muslims as some majority Muslim countries have done to Baha’is. For example, an American Muslim living in the United States, Canada, or Britain has the right to obtain birth certificates for her children, her Islamic marriage is recognized, she can own property, open a bank account, obtain a social security card, a passport, a driver’s license, and so on. In Egypt, Baha’is simply do not exist and have no human rights even if their ancestors of six generations ago were also Baha’i. Justice demands the Egyptian government to emanicipate the Baha’is in Egypt, grant them the rights of every other Egyptian citizen, and let the theological debate about which Faith is right or wrong to theologians and individuals alike to decide for themselves. Egypt, the cradle of civilization has to take the lead in guaranteeing the human rights of every citizen regardless of religion, creed, or beliefs. Religion is God’s, and the country is for all its citizens.