Unlicensed mosque demolished to continue road construction

CAIRO - 19 August 2019: Executive Agencies in Alexandria enforced early on Monday a decree to demolish Sidi Aboul Ikhlas Al-Zorkany Mosque, located in the pathway of a road that is still under construction.

Sidi Abou l Ikhlas Al-Zorkany Mosque housed a shrine that has been relocated temporarily to the Mosques Square in Alexandria. The square contains many shrines like Al-Morsy Aboul Abbas, Sidi Yacout, and Al-Abasiry.

The road to be inaugurated within few months is Al Mahmoudeya Axis extending over 21.6 kilometers with a cost of LE5 billion. The axis includes four bridges and a road consisting of 6-8 lanes in each direction to serve four neighborhoods in Montaza.

A new Sidi Aboul Ikhlas Al-Zorkany Mosque will be built after the road is finished bringing back the shrine from Mosques Square. That is in addition to 14 developmental projects - including a market - offering different services to citizens.

President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi brought up the matter on Saturday while inaugurating 1,302 greenhouses in Mohamed Naguib Military Base as officials were presenting the projects that are still underway.



The president highlighted that places of worship shall not be built upon state-owned land without a license as that may negatively affect the public interest. “A place of worship deserves a prime location granted by the state,” the president asserted.

Sidi Aboul Ikhlas Al-Zorkany Mosque was built in 1985, six years after the death of Sheikh Borhan El-Din Bin Ahmed Bin Mohamed Ali Bin Mohamed Al-Zorkany, founder of the Supreme Ikhlasiyah Sufi movement, moving his body from a tiny mosque elsewhere.

The latest figure released by the Ministry of Culture in 2015 on the number of shrines in Egypt is 6,000.