Over the past year, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has sought to make it clear that it is not seeking a dominant role in the country’s politics.

During the protests that ultimately resulted in the ousting of President Hosni Mubarak in February 2011, the group kept a deliberately low profile, claiming that it did not want the overthrowing of the regime to be characterised as an Islamic revolution.

Once parliamentary elections were called, the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), an offshoot of the Brotherhood, said that it would only contest a minority of the seats. It duly returned a minority, albeit the largest one, with 47 per cent of the seats in the lower house. The FJP also pledged that it would not nominate its own presidential candidate in order to avoid being seen as monopolising all the arms of state.

But now the perception in Egypt is that the FJP is trying to do just that. Appointments to the assembly created in late March to draw up a new constitution were perceived to be so skewed towards the Islamists of the FJP and the Salafist Al-Nour party that almost all of the secular appointees resigned within days.

To make things worse, the Brotherhood declared that it would after all field a presidential candidate, as it could not find a reason to back any of the existing candidates.

Ironically, for those that are wary of an Islamic government in Egypt, the Brotherhood’s chosen candidate, the millionaire businessman Khairat al-Shater, may be the best option. The nomination of Al-Shater may, in part, be an attempt to combat the rising popularity of another presidential candidate, Hazem Salah Abu Ismail, a conservative Islamist who openly champions the establishment of an Islamic state in Egypt.

The Brotherhood and the FJP have made great efforts to convince foreign governments, particularly the US, that they can not only work together, but also be a force for moderation. Now all it needs to do is convince Egyptians.