Rabat – The French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) elected Morocco’s Mohamed Moussaoui as president. Moussaoui is the current president of the Union of French Mosques (UMF).
The CFCM is the highest public representative of Islam in France.
Moussaoui became the sole candidate for the post after French-Algerian Chems Eddine Hafiz left the presidential race. Hafiz cited his new function as rector of the Great Mosque of Paris as the reason behind his withdrawal.
The French-Moroccan is entering his third tenure as president of the CFCM after serving for two mandates in a row from 2008 to 2013.
The CFCM’s Board of Directors held a meeting at the Grand Mosque in Paris to select a list of figures to hold positions of responsibility within the CFCM: President, vice-presidents, secretary-general, and treasurer.
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The Board of Directors also elected two vice-presidents, Hafiz and Ibrahim Alci who are set to serve as presidents in 2022 and 2024, respectively.
The French government created CFCM in 2003 to collaborate with public authorities on all Islam-related questions and regulate Muslim religious activities in France. Roughly 6 million Muslims live in France.
Who is Mohamed Moussaoui?
Moussaoui is an intellectual from Figuig, eastern Morocco. He obtained a bachelor’s in Mathematics and Physics from Rabat’s Mohammed V University in 1986.
He then migrated to France to pursue a Ph.D. at Montpellier University, graduating in 1990.
Parallel to his university course, Moussaoui received training in the fundamentals of religion and Islamic sciences from Moroccan scholars. The training enabled him to deliver Friday sermons in many mosques in France. He delivered his first sermon in 1988.
In 1991, he joined Avignon University, where he worked as a lecturer.
In March 1998, Moussaoui moved into research and authored numerous articles in the field of mathematics.
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The 55-year-old is also a founding member of the Conference of Religious Officials in France, established in 2010. The Conference includes six bodies responsible for Islam, Christian churches (Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant), Judaism, and Buddhism.
He has also participated in many national and international conferences on Islamic thought and interfaith dialogue.
