The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood filed the incorrect forms to be registered as a non-governmental organisation, state-run MENA reported on Wednesday. The Brotherhood is officially not registered in Egypt and their members were often persecuted under the reigns of former presidents Hosni Mubarak, Anwar Sadat and Gamal Abdel Nasser.
The decision to register comes after widespread popular pressure on the Brotherhood to have a fully functioning and registered organisation with accurate member counts and income statements.
Despite the mishandling of their registration forms, the Muslim Brotherhood announced the launch of a new Facebook page. According to the new page, called Ikhwan.Official, it was established on September 12 but was only unveiled on Wednesday.
The page mentions the brotherhood’s “belief in the importance of communicating with our honourable and decent Egyptians everywhere.” The new page is meant to be a bridge between the people and the party, helping keep their followers up to date. Combined with the @IkhwanOfficial twitter handle and both the Arabic and English Brotherhood websites, they now the major types of social media used in Egypt.
One of the first posts on their new page was an attack on the Egyptian Liberation newspaper, accusing them of, “lying and slandering the brotherhood and its symbols.” The brotherhood page accused the paper of running an article on Wednesday which reported that the brotherhood had attempted to negotiate a deal with former presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq.
