The People's Assembly (PA) Committee on Religious Affairs said yesterday it would re-discuss the bill on preachers' pay-scale after it was rejected last week by the Ministry of Finance under the pretext of lack of appropriations. Ahmad Omar Hashim, chairman of the committee, said the PA Speaker Ahmed Fathi Sorour kept alive the hope that preachers would have a pay-scale, after he phoned Minister of Wakfs (religious endowment) Hamdi Zaqzouq and asked him to make an urgent study so that the PA could re-discuss the bill before the end of the current parliamentary session.
Hashim added that some 50 MPs had filed requests to Sorour to re-discuss the draft law. He launched a bitter attack on Youssef Boutros Ghali, Minister of Finance, saying: "His response to the bill could drive all preachers around the world to despair and frustration." LE200 million has been allocated for improving conditions of imams and preachers. We proposed to use this sum in the pay-scale, which will only cost LE186 million. This means that the Minister of Finance does not have any argument, Hashim added. Thousands of preachers could not meet their basic needs. Some of them could not buy bread for three days, Hashim said, confirming that the Parliament will discuss the bill today or tomorrow at the most. MP Alaa Hassanein said the re-discussion of the bill is a great victory for the PA Committee on Religious Affairs. He described preachers' pay-scale as more important than teachers' pay-scale.
