Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood's deputy chairman Khairat al-Shater Cairo – Akram Ali Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood announced on Saturday evening nominating its Deputy Supreme Guide Khairat al-Shater for presidency. The brotherhood leaders told reporters in the press conference following the organisation emergency meeting that Khairat al-Shater has left his post to run for president.
In a complete change of position, Brotherhood leaders said that due to "a serious threat to the revolution," candidates that represent Mubarak's regime, and a government that has failed to express the will of the people, they had decided that it was necessary to field a candidate.
Previously the group originally pledged that no Brother would run for president to calm secular and western governments’ fears of a complete Islamist takeover by the group.
The Facebook page of the Muslim Brotherhood's political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, also announced shortly before the press conference Saturday evening that party's parliamentary bloc will endorse al-Shater as a presidential candidate.
Al-Shater, however, should be legally disqualified from running. The leading Brotherhood member is serving out a five-year prison sentence a military court issued in 2008.   After President Hosni Mubarak left office, the leading military council released Shater for what it said were medical reasons.
Egyptian legal experts say that, according to Egyptian law, a person is not eligible to run for public office if he or she is serving a prison sentence. Al-Shater’s candidacy announcement raises the question of whether a pardon is in the near future for him.
The military council recently pardoned Ghad al-Thawra Party leader and Mubarak-era dissident Ayman Nour, freeing him to run for public office. Nour was sentenced to five years in prison for allegedly forging signatures on petitions to register his political party in 2005 when he ran against then-President Hosni Mubarak in elections.
Brotherhood leaders denied that Shater was ineligible.
Regarding al-Shater’s eligibility, the group said in its website that, Abdel-Moneim Abdel-Maksoud, the Muslim Brotherhood's lawyer, said that he will receive candidacy papers for Khairat al-Shater, the presidential candidate nominated by the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) and the Brotherhood, on Sunday morning, from the headquarters of the High Judicial Elections Commission for Presidential Elections.
Abdel-Maksoud said that all legal documents and procedures required for al-Shater, Deputy Chairman of the Muslim Brotherhood, to exercise his full political rights, especially the right of candidacy and voting, have been completed over the past few days, the online statement added.
Those legal actions pertain to Case No. 2 of 2007 Military Offenses, known in Egyptian media as the "Azhar Militias Case", in which al-Shater was perversely sentenced to seven years in prison, of which he spent about 4 and a half years, and was released for medical reasons in March 2011, days after the January 25 revolution.
A few days ago, the Supreme Military Court issued a ruling conclusively exonerating Deputy Chairman of the Muslim Brotherhood al-Shater of all charges in Case No. 8 of 1995 Military Offenses, known in Egyptian media as the “Brotherhood Shura Council Case”, in which al-Shater was perversely sentenced to five years in prison for “revival of a banned group,” the statement continued.
According to the provisions of law and the Constitutional Declaration, any convict can be exonerated with a ruling issued by a criminal court, while military justice is the competent authority for exonerating any person convicted by military courts in accordance with the rules and procedures set forth in Law No. 2 of 1969 concerning exonerating prisoners of military court sentences.
According to the law, exonerating or clearing the name of a person results in deleting all records of the wrongful conviction and cancellation of all consequent actions, restoring all the civil rights he was deprived of due to the perverse verdict.
Al-Shater is the fourth Islamists running for the post. Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, a former leading member of the group, Hazem Abu Ismail, an ultraconservative preacher, and Selim al-Awa, an Islamic academic, have already been campaigning in the heated race for weeks, the statement concluded.