Cherif El-Ayouty (63), is a Muslim immigrant from Egypt, speaks fluent Danish, has worked as a civil engineer since he came to Denmark in 1968 and became a Danish citizen.
When he got his voting rights he first voted for the Progress Party, but he says he's voted for the Danish People's Party (DPP) in all elections since it was founded in 1995 since it's the only party that defends western values.
"The army can protect my country from external attacks. The police can protect my property. But it's only the Danes themselves who can protect their values. The DPP does that."
He says that other parties says they represent the same values as human rights and equality between men and women. But the other parties don't protect Denmark against those who attack the values. For him the DPP is a type of political army.
El-Ayouty supports the restrictions on immigration, and says that they attract the right immigrants, and keep the wrong ones out.
He believes that he would still manage to enter the country today, and that he's certain that scientists and artists who can contribute to Denmark can still enter the country. Thousands of doctors still come in from the Middle East and other countries. He doesn't think the DPP is against importing capable people, but if Denmark would have undertaken those restrictions 20 years ago, they would have avoided getting the wrong immigrants, he says, pointing to the extensive family reunification immigration, which is not self-supporting.
El-Ayouty doesn't think that the DPP are "anti-Muslim", but that they're against Muslims whose attitudes conflict with Danish values.
El-Ayouty is a believing Muslim. He prays and observes the fast of Ramadan, but doesn't put a lot of emphasis on halal. He's currently working on a book with the work-title "A textbook for today's Muslim." In the thick manuscript he describes the principles for a modern Islam, without headscarves and Sharia law, but with equality and human rights.
He thinks that if the Muslim world won't develop and follow the rest of the world they will disintegrate, like the Neanderthals.
He thinks the message of Islam has been misunderstood by many Muslims, who are now pulling the Muslim world away from development. He wants to see the world's Muslims creating a better society in the Middle East, and calls on Muslim countries to follow the West, by separating Church and Stae, and aspiring for scientific development.
"Everything that humanity had achieved, for example construction, progress, technology and sciene, took place in the West. The best life man can have is in the West."
El-Ayouty has done well in Denmark, getting contracts in the millions. He thinks it's important to integrate into Danish society, in contract to the Muslims who he says 'annoy' their neighbors by wearing a headscarf and not shaking hands with the opposite sex.
"The headscarf has nothing to do with Islam. It's a symbol of women's oppression, and it's offensive to the whole of humanity. The women who go with headscarves accept being oppressed and being worth less than a man." He doesn't believe they choose it on their own, since if they don't the men around them won't marry them.
Above all, he thinks the oppression of women in the Muslim world makes men the weaker sex, since he must see women as being worth less.
"Men are so weak that they think they can't handle an equal woman. They think that with power she'll be lower than them. With social power, with religion's power, with the state's power. They are weak men. But a man should be strong and have a woman as an equal partner."
He's never prayed in a Danish mosque, since he says many Danish Muslim want to practice their religion demonstratively, to show who's the best Muslim.
He says that for him Islam is something internal, a private issue between him and his god, but there are many who keep count - if they do a good deed, pray in Mecca, or say something good about Islam, they get points. He thinks it's annoying.
El-Ayouty thinks the world's Muslims are to blame for the Islam-skepticism in the West after the terror attacks of 9/11. It's difficult for him to be insulted by the Muhammad cartoons, where the cartoonist just drew their impression of Islam.
"When Islam has a poor image in the West, Muslims must also accept being criticized. It's their own fault, that Islam has a bad name." He says it's certainly not the Christians who are responsible.
He loves Muhammed like many other Muslims, but he's not insulted by the cartoons. He says Muhammad is above that. He's not insulted if a dog barks at him, and he's not insulted if somebody calls him a dumb pig. He doesn't understand why Muslims in the Middle East aren't insulted by living in such misery. "You live oppressed, like a wretched animal in your own country. You're not insulted by that?" he asks rhetorically.
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El-Ayouty, does everything that the DPP asks from immigrants, and yet he was not accepted as a member.
He says that when he called Poul Lindholm, the party secretary, he was told that he's too well known.
He had not received any explanation as to why he can't join the party, but he got back a check with his paid dues. He thinks it has to do with his book "Aladdins intime oplevelser" (Alladin's intimate adventures), where he wrote of a prince resembling Prince Henrik. He thinks the party is upset since it supports Danish royalty.
The fictional prince has intimate relations with Kiki Tholstrup, who later married Roger Moore.
El-Ayouty says he thinks he might have been too controversial because of his book, or that they think he's a rabid Islamist who wants to destroy the party, but he doesn't think it's because he's a Muslim.
The DPP did not want to comment on why he can't be a member, whether other Danish Muslims have been rejected or whether the party has Muslim members.
Lindholm says that people's religion does not interest them, and that only acceptance criteria is Danish citizenship.
El-Ayouty is currently a member of the Conservatives, and has been a paying member since 2006.
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El-Ayouty now intends to marry his Danish girlfriend, Susanne, in both a Christian and Muslim ceremony, without either of them converting.
The Muslim ceremony will be conducted by Imam Abdul Wahid Pedersen, one of Denmark's most radical imams.
El-Ayouty says that the marriage is not just a social event for him, but a sign that a Muslim can can marry in a Christian church without having to leave his religion.
He says his brother in Egypt had told him he couldn't, but he'd asked two Muslim scholars - Mufti El-Sham and professor Al-Fiq from Al-Azhar University, and they said it wasn't a problem.
The priest was not available for comment, but Imam Pedersen says that he'd done such marriages before and that it's not an problem as long as both parties agree.
Though Pedersen refused to reject stoning in the past, El-Ayouty thinks Pedersen is the right imam, and says that he's become more liberal and moderate in the past few years and that he bothers nobody.
Sources: Nyhedsavisen 1, 2, 3 (Danish)
See also: Denmark: "We're anti-Muslim, but not fanatics" , Denmark: Renewed debate about hijab
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