PARIS,
June 17 (IslamOnline.net) - Dalil Boubakeur, Imam of Paris Grand Mosque
and head of the French Council for Islamic Religion (FCIR), threatened
to resign Monday, June 16, following his front defeat in the elections
of the FCIR's municipalities.
The
pro-Muslim Brotherhood Union of Islamic Organizations in France (UIOF)
secured a landslide victory in the elections held Sunday, June 15, over
other French Islamic organizations, reported to be backed by foreign
countries.
French
Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy called Monday a meeting grouping
Boubakeur, UIOC chief Althuhami Ibriz, and Mohammad Bushari, president
of the National Confederation of Muslims in France (NCMF), to dispel the
cloud.
After
the meeting Boubakeur announced he was withdrawing his resignation.
Speaking
to IslamOnline.net, Ibriz said the meeting reviewed the outcome of the
elections, recalling that Sarkozy asked him to give up some
municipalities to strike the balance between different Islamic groups.
The
UIOF chief asserted that he had rebuffed such a demand, boasting that
his group won 13 seats out of a total of 25.
Boubakeur's
FCIR, which is said to be supported by Algeria, got only two seats,
while the NCMF and the League of Turkish Muslims in France won five
seats each.
Ibriz
stressed that the outcome of the elections proved that the Muslims of
France rally behind the UIOF, noting that the union's rivals held an
in-camera meeting on May 2 to share the seats of the municipalities with
the aim of excluding the UIOF.
"Their
meeting backfired on them and we emerged victorious," confident
Ibriz said.
On
Boubakeur's resignation threat, the UIOF leader said Boubakeur should be
"a good loser."
"Everybody
knows that we agreed to give him the FCIR presidency that to serve the
interests of French Muslims and for the sake of reconciliation and no
mkore," Ibriz asserted.
For
his part, Boubakeur argued that he could not preside over a council that
was dominated by "fundamentalists."
