Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli has announced the legalisation of the status of 76 churches and service buildings, bringing the total number of churches and affiliated buildings that have so far been licensed by the committee to 1,958.
This was established during the meeting of the committee responsible for legalising the status of churches chaired by Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli.
Cabinet Spokesman Nader Saad said the meeting was attended by Minister of Justice Omar Marwan, Minister of Local Development Mahmoud Shaarawi and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Alaa el Din Fouad.
The committee members deliberated on the outcome of reviews conducted since its latest meeting on April 12 about the churches and service buildings that demanded legalising their status, he added.
The Cabinet’s decision to legalise churches comes according to 2016’s article number 80 of the law regulating building churches.
Several conditions were laid in the statement for the churches to be finally recognised by the government as legal religious buildings. These conditions include meeting the requirements for civil protection within a period of four months and fulfilling all the state’s rights regarding the rationing of the land on which such buildings are built.
The approval may be withdrawn if the buildings do not finish civil protection facilities in four months.
On January 9, Egypt’s Ministry of Housing issued a decision to allocate lands to establish 37 churches in various new cities, Walid Abbas, assistant housing minister revealed
The authority also approved establishing seven other churches in new cities in 2018, besides the Church of Nativity, the Middle East’s biggest church that has been inaugurated in Egypt’s New Administrative Capital.