The predicament of the church of Amir Tadros (St Theodore) in Gardenia City compound, the land of which is owned by the Defence Ministry, still awaits resolution. Anba Eklemandos, Bishop of Eastern Nasr City and Almaza, joined by Fr Mina, priest of church, recently met Major General Moheb Habashy, aide to the Defence Minister; and Major General Ashraf Barakat, director of the Officers Housing Fund, who both promised that the matter would be resolved as soon as possible.
The church in Gardenia City is engaged in a land dispute with the owners of the residential compound, the Defence Ministry.
The story of the church goes back a few years when the first phase of the residential development was officially opened by President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi. The President asked the owner and developers: “Where is the church?” Upon the reply that there was no church, the President said it was not acceptable that any new development would include no church, and demanded that land should be allocated for one in Gardenia City compound.
Land was indeed allocated for a church in Gardenia, but it was only an area of 250sq.m located at the lower tip of a hillside plateau. According to building regulations, the church was built on a mere 144sq.m, and could accommodate no more than some 250 worshippers. As future phases of the development were built, the number of Copts swelled to 2,200 families, that is a congregation of some 9,000 members.
Gardenia church became severely overcrowded; worshippers who found no place inside the church had to sit or stand in the courtyard under awnings specially erected for them, with screens and microphones relaying what is going on inside the church. The Church officials thus wrote in May 2021 to the Defence Ministry, then again in September 2023 to the presidential aide in charge of urban planning, requesting the allocation of a further 5,500sq.m to the Church.
The Church explained it needed to expand because of the great rise in the number of the congregation, detailing its building plans. The area requested represented the full area of the plateau which included no buildings; the church was built at its lowest tip and the extension of the land was on much higher ground. The road going around the plateau was much lower than the higher ground, meaning that the plateau’s higher end could only be accessed from its lowest tip through the church gate. Again, there was no official reply, despite oral pledges by the owners to approve the allocation of the land to the Church. The Church saw this pledge as credible, given the well-established legal principle that prevails in property dealings or disputes, which stipulates that the direct neighbour is entitled to priority status in resolving property right issues.
On Sunday 12 May 2024, right after morning Mass, a number of strangers visited the church priest, claiming they needed to access the plateau land since they had had it allocated for them to build a recreational project that included coffee shops, restaurants, and playgrounds. The priests, Fr Marcos Zaghloul and Fr Mina Wilson, informed their Bishop, Anba Eklemandos, who directly called the relevant authorities to discuss the matter. The strangers were denied access to the land, and left.
On Thursday 16 May, and despite continued talks between the Bishop and the authorities, the congregation was stunned to discover that a bulldozer sent by the alleged investors was attempting to access the disputed land through the church gate. Scores of congregation members swiftly gathered to confront the bulldozer, blocking its way, many repeatedly praying “Kyrie Eleison” (Lord, have mercy). Others parked their cars along the road surrounding the plateau, to hinder any attempted entry by the bulldozer into the land from any other point. Bishop Eklemandos and the priests contacted the relevant authorities who then ordered the bulldozer off.
The Bishop submitted to the authorities copies of the two official requests by the Church for land allocation. Together with the priests and the congregation, they gathered signatures to a SOS petition which they sent to President Sisi, explaining their predicament and their dire need for a larger church, the unanswered applications they had submitted for the land adjacent to the church to be allocated to them, the oral promises they had been given to this effect, and citing the events that had taken place since 12 May.
They reminded the President that the church was built in Gardenia City compound first and foremost in response to his own demand that the compound should include a place of worship for Christians just as it included places of worship for Muslims.
The following day, Friday 17 May, Anba Eklemandos celebrated Mass at the church in Gardenia. He told the congregation that he was untiringly striving for the legal priority right of their church to the adjacent land, as the only direct neighbour. He said he had presented a new memorandum to that effect to the authorities, insisting that the Church would pay all dues required for land allocation. He affirmed his confidence that the matter would be resolved in favour of the Church.
Watani International
22 May 2024
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