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Issue no. 728 June 2012 LE5

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A president and half a government

Politics with okra at Somaya’s

What do you know about dictators and book prizes?

Rich boys and private channels

The road to Zion, and the airlift back

Liberals meet and complain

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Published by Al-Masry Media Corp

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2 News Briefs

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28 June 2012

Morsy up, Mubarak downFormer President Hosni Mubarak’s health deteriorated immediately after he heard that Mohamed Morsy had become the president of Egypt, sources told Al-Masry Al-Youm. The sources said his blood pres-sure went up and his heart beat became irregular on hearing the news. Mubarak was sentenced

to life in prison for complicity in the killing of demonstrators during the 18-day uprising that led to his ouster. He reportedly told his doctors that he was surprised the Islamists took the presidency, particularly the Brotherhood. Morsy has said he will retry Mubarak, his two sons and the symbols of his regime.■

The people demand easier exams

General’s appeal adjourned

Thwarted migration

Parents of students in the second stage of Thanaweya Amma (the last year of secondary school) protested against the difficulty level of the advanced mathematics exam in Suez on Monday. The education minister ordered a committee to examine the difficulty of the exam in response to

the complaints. Students complained about the difficulty of the mathemat-ics exam and the short exam period. They also said there were many ques-tions that differed from the sample questions provided in advance by the Education Ministry, as well as from previous years’ exams.■

Cairo’s Court of Appeals adjourned on Monday the hearing of Major General Hussein Saeed Mohamed Moussa’s appeal against a verdict finding him guilty of destroying evidence regard-ing the killing of protestors during the 2011 revolution. The appeal will be considered on 16 July. Last year, the Cairo Misdemeanor Court found the

former director of the Central Security Telecommunications Department guilty of destroying the Central Secu-rity Operation Room phone records following the revolution, and sen-tenced him to two years in prison. The former official appealed the verdict the same year and has been released on bail pending the result of his appeal.■

Thirty one young men were ar-rested on Monday in Motobas, Kafr al-Sheikh, for planning to emigrate to Italy without proper documenta-tion. A person had filed a complaint against suspicious activity in a neigh-bor’s house. A team of officers raided the house, where they found 31 men preparing to emigrate. Investiga-

tions revealed that the young men had come to Kafr al-Sheikh from six governorates around Egypt to try to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Italy. The defendants confessed to having paid LE30,000 each to four brokers, in exchange for help completing the voyage. The prosecution is currently searching for the brokers.■

More Mubarak corruption investigations

Shafiq haters in Hurghada

The Justice Ministry has begun investigating several complaints filed against ousted President Hosni Mubarak and former Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation, Youssef Wali. They are accused of seizing large areas of land owned by the General Authority for Fish Resources Development and allocat-ing it to the Cooperative Housing

Association for Military Pilots, a judicial source said. Judge Osama al-Saidi on Monday requested evidence regarding the case as well as related allegations against former presiden-tial candidate Ahmed Shafiq, who is accused of selling land belonging to the Pilots Association to Mubarak’s sons, Alaa and Gamal Mubarak, at well below market value.■

Demonstrators celebrating Mohamed Morsy’s victory in the presidential elections vandalized rival candidate Ahmed Shafiq’s Hurghada cam-paign headquarters on Nasr Street. A mass rally from al-Dahhar Square to al-Saqala Square Monday led to a number of protestors tearing down

pro-Shafiq banners and posters from the exterior of the office, which had been hung up during the runoff election campaign. Security forces in charge of protecting the building left their positions after Morsy was an-nounced the new president of Egypt earlier on Sunday afternoon.■

The Presidential Elections Commission announces results

Anxious parents protest about “too hard” exam

Soldiers deployed in downtown Cairo

From Gaza to Ismailia to jail

Oil leak in Gamsha Bay

Ismailia police arrested Saturday five Palestinians who had entered the country without proper documentation. Secu-rity forces assigned to secure vehicle and pedestrian ferries at the west side of the Suez Canal, west of Ismailia, found five Palestinians attempting to cross to the eastern side. They were in possession of a car but did not have ownership documents. The five admitted entering the country through tunnels below the eastern borders of the town of Rafah, in northern Sinai. The defendants were taken to the prosecu-tion, and other legal actions have also been undertaken.■

A leakage of light crude oil took place in Gamsha Bay on the Red Sea on Monday at both the onshore and offshore sites of the General Petroleum Company. This is the ninth such leakage since September. The Environment Ministry dispatched a team of researchers to check the sites as the ministry prepares to take legal action against the company. In October, the Environment Ministry fined the company LE2 million following a gas leak in the same area.■

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Jailbreak in Minya

Mohamed Ibrahim

Eight prisoners detained at the Dier Mawas police station in Minya escaped Monday while police were preoccupied with celebrations for President-elect Mohamed Morsy. The police captured six of the prisoners after injuring one by shooting him in the foot. Five other prisoners refused to escape with the rest, despite having the opportunity to do so. One of them is currently serving a life term. A bystander was wounded by a stray bullet during the chase. Last week, the interior minister announced a plan to secure national facilities in anticipation of the announce-ment of the presidential election results.■

No more powers to arrest

An administrative court overturned a government decree allowing the army to arrest civilians on Tuesday.The decree was issued by the army-backed interim government before the June presidential run-offs. The decree was issued by

the justice minister, giving military and intelligence officers powers of arrest. The decree was challenged by rights activists and politicians who accused the generals of reviving the Emergency Law that lapsed in May.■

3News28 June 2012

For now, Morsy has little choice but to agree to these conditions or he might lose everything

Morsy and his campaign are pragmatic. They don’t want a showdown at this moment

Morsy greets members of the High Council of Police

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must first obtain approval from the military council. The document also takes away from Morsy the title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

But a power-sharing agreement with the military would be a de fac-to continuation of the old regime which, since 1952, has seen a clear split between so-called service and sovereign ministries. Sovereign ministries are usually related to national security, and they are the ones the Brotherhood is expected to cede.

Morsy and his group have changed their rhetoric toward the SCAF since his victory and after vehement criticism over the last few weeks. In his first national ad-dress on Sunday, Morsy thanked the armed forces for their efforts during the transition. Field Mar-shal Hussein Tantawi, the head of the military council, met with Morsy on Tuesday and said the military would stand with the in-coming president.

“Morsy and his campaign are pragmatic. They don’t want a showdown at this moment — it’s not part of their makeup. They want gradual change and they want to be true to the revolution at the same time,” said Maha Azzam, an associate fellow with the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House and an expert on Islamist groups in Egypt.

Security Since winning the election, Morsy has been making the rounds of government institutions, looking to iron out differences and shore up his presidency by building working partnerships with govern-ment institutions that may have been loath to the idea of working under an Islamist.

On Monday, he met with the High Council of Police to discuss

public security and assure senior officials that he would not take revenge against them for past transgressions against his fellow Brothers. He shook hands with a member of the High Council of Police, once his jailer in 2006.

Morsy, a longtime leading Broth-erhood figure, was twice impris-oned for participating in protests, first over judiciary independence in 2006, and on 28 January last year, during the 18-day uprising.

The Brotherhood itself spent the majority of its 84-year existence as a banned group, subject to an array of security clampdowns and mass arrests by a police force that was taught to treat the group with suspicion and often resorted to brutal tactics to suppress its mem-bers. The desire for revenge is not inconceivable for some.

Yet the Brotherhood and its Freedom and Justice Party have been displaying a strong tendency toward political pragmatism in-stead of dogmatic ideology, ob-servers said.

“There’s a general agreement in the FJP and the Morsy campaign to open a new page with all groups and institutions. We understand why some may have a miscon-ception of us, our history and our work on the ground, and we will work on changing that,” Ali Bat-teekh, another leading Brother-hood figure and a former MP, told Egypt Independent.

But while no significant clashes are expected to ensue between Morsy and the security apparatus, obtaining full control over it would

require an element of purging. “He will have to get rid of some

of the Interior Ministry figure-heads to get a better grip on the police,” said Mohamed Mahfouz, a former police officer and a found-ing member of the Honorable Po-lice Officers Coalition. Mahfouz believes garnering loyalty from the rest of the police will not pose a significant problem.

“The Police Academy teaches obedience to power. Even if you put a monkey on the throne, they would obey him,” said Mahfouz. He said cadets in the Police Acad-emy were also taught to look at all political groups with disdain, not just the Brotherhood.

MediaOther institutions, such as the state media, have traditionally been anti-Brotherhood. Yet their modus operandi is to pay alle-giance to whoever is in power, a fact demonstrated by how quickly they changed their long reverence to Hosni Mubarak once the ruling military council took his position in February 2011.

Today, questions still loom over whether the state-owned media is ideologically opposed to Islamists in a way that could entail a Muba-rak-style grip over them.

“There was a vicious media cam-paign to tarnish the image of Is-lamists. They played a big part in political polarization in the recent period by propagating the failure of the Brotherhood in Parliament,” said Shahira Amin, a state TV pre-senter.

State media has been under the control of the military authori-ties, which will seek to maintain it, Amin said. “The state media loyalty will probably remain to the SCAF. It’s in their interest to maintain the status quo, which might jeopardize Morsy’s presidency,” she added.

The futureWhile the current word is on Morsy ceding “sovereign” powers to the ruling generals, this doesn’t necessarily reflect the ultimate am-bitions of the Brotherhood, said Mohamed Menza, an associate professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.

“They have been [splitting pow-er] in their favor since before the election,” said Menza, referring to what he said was negotiations by the Brotherhood to secure a quo-ta for its members in the police force.

Menza said the SCAF would not relinquish its control over these institutions, and that if Morsy and the Brotherhood attempted to con-trol them, the council would use its control of the Defense and Interior ministries to suppress them.

“If Morsy ruled with the goal of maximizing the Brotherhood’s members in state institutions, and not seeking genuine reform based on meritocracy and democratic principles, it would lead to the fail-ure of his Renaissance Project and the end of the Brotherhood,” he added, referring to Morsy’s elec-toral platform.

For others, like the Brother-hood’s Batteekh, controlling gov-ernment institutions is not the main priority. “I think our main is-sue is the process of bringing for-ward a new Parliament or settling a new constitution. I see that as the biggest impediment to Morsy having a successful presidency,” he said.■

A pragmatic victoryMorsy strikes a power-sharing deal to shore up presidency By Rana Khazbak

and Mohamed Elmeshad

any Egyptians have not yet sobered from the ecstasy of finally getting a civilian president, for

the first time in the history of the 60-year-old republic.

But only a few days after the an-nouncement of Muslim Brother-hood presidential candidate Mo-hamed Morsy’s victory, signs point to a less-than-perfect picture, in which the old regime’s rules still persist.

Despite the showdown between the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces and the Brotherhood in the months preceding the elec-tion, Morsy’s victory reveals a new phase of political arrangements be-tween the two. For one, they have already come to a decision on how to split control over government institutions, said Essam Haddad, a Morsy aide.

According to Haddad, an initial agreement entails that the army will maintain control over its bud-get and internal affairs but will not intervene in the assembly charged with drafting the country’s new constitution.

An anoynmous source told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the Broth-erhood will be in charge of the ministries of Finance and Foreign Affairs but will be required to keep away from the Defense, Interior and Justice ministries.

The amicable agreement be-tween the military council and the Brotherhood would confine the Islamist group’s authority to these institutions, and safeguard the SCAF from being sidelined by a non-allied president.

“We are indeed in negotiations with the military council,” said Sobhi Saleh, a leading Brother-hood figure.

However, the arrangement plants a ticking time bomb that could jeopardize Morsy’s presi-dency, once he and his group seek to expand their powers.

Bahey el-din Hassan, director of the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies, said the two sides had clearly come to an agreement.

“Morsy’s victory is not just based on getting the majority of votes, but also on a power-sharing agreement that took place with the SCAF, in which the military will maintain its control over the national security ministries and institutions, includ-ing defense, police, intelligence and justice,” Hassan said.

But Morsy may have had few other options. “At least for now, Morsy has little choice but to agree to these conditions or he might lose everything, especially with the existence of the supplementary constitutional declaration,” Hassan said.

Only a few days before the elec-tion, the ruling military council added an addendum to the Con-stitutional Declaration that has governed Egypt since March 2011. The declaration limits the powers of the president and adds to those of the military council, with respect to the state budget, constitution-writing assembly and the ability to declare war, for which the president

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4 News28 June 2012

If the court seemed less partial to influence from the executive branch, an ensuing spat with Parliament cast aspersions on the dynamic between the Islamist bloc and the judiciary

the ruling generals over keeping two-thirds of Parliament while disbanding the third deemed unconstitutional.

The Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party member Sobhi Saleh told state-run news agency MENA that the new president would not decide on Parliament’s dissolution before the court’s verdict is referred to the Supreme Administrative Court; if the Administrative Court approves the verdict, the president would offer it to a popular referendum. But the State Council Administrative Court adjourned the appeal on the Parliament dissolution on Tuesday to 9 July, leaving no legal channel for the president to contest the ruling ahead of his swearing-in deadline of 30 June.

Saleh and fellow Brothers have consistently argued that while the SCC verdict is not objec-tionable, its implementation is illegal.

“Morsy should swear the oath in front of Parliament, that’s what the law dictates,” said Ahmad Mekky, former vice-president of the Court of Cassation. Mekky also held that the legislature still exists.

“There is a Parliament. The SCC ruled that some texts were unconstitutional, that is all. There should be a separation of powers, mean-ing that a court cannot dissolve a parliament, and besides, we can still function with two-thirds since the ruling only affected a third of the seats.”

The reality though is that MPs are prohibited from entering the building, to which Mekky re-sponded, “Then that is a show of strength, no more.” He added that Parliament cannot be dis-solved unless by the will of the people through a referendum, as the people are the source of all legitimacy.

However, Nasser Amin, the head of the Arab Center for the Independence of the Judiciary contended that there was significant precedent for the ruling to dissolve Parliament, since the court had twice dissolved parliaments during the Mubarak era.

“The SCC should not have a position of its own; it bases its decisions on precedents and principles that are related to the electoral law. And it only rules on constitutionality. The de-cision (to dissolve Parliament) was easy for the court because of the precedent of 1984 and 1987 when it declared Parliament unconstitu-tional. And we should bear in mind that those two parliaments had a National Democratic Party majority,” he said, referencing Mubarak’s ruling party.

Gebali clarified that the SCC ruling decreed the “nullification” of parliament, not its “disso-lution,” confirming Mekky’s claims that a court cannot dissolve Parliament. However, once the court makes such a decision and it is published in the Official Gazette, then it becomes appli-cable on the parliamentary body.

But the dispute goes deeper than the con-troversial dissolution of Parliament. While the president of the republic was assigned to appoint the head of the SCC, a recent amendment in the court law allows more input from the court’s general assem-bly. This amendment “now gives the court more independence,” Gebali told Egypt Inde-pendent.

So if the court seemed less partial to influence

Tit for tatThe Brotherhood and the SCC: Not quite one hand

Saad ElKatatny Speaker of Parliament

Maher ElBiheryChairman of SCC

By Abdel-Rahman Husseinmidst a war of words, Egypt’s newly elected President Mohamed Morsy is yet to decide whether he will take his oath of office before the Supreme

Constitutional Court (SCC), his acting spokes-person Yasser Aly told the state-run MENA on Tuesday.

The provision that the president would swear in before the court came in the form of the supplementary Constitutional Declaration issued by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces last week.

The feud over who the president should take the oath before symbolizes an intricate rela-tionship between the executive and legislative branches on one hand, and the judiciary on the other, especially if the former has Islamists at their helm.

Tahany al-Gibali, the court’s vice president, distanced the bench from the conversation about the presidential oath, but deemed it legal for the president to swear in before the court. “We have not received any information regard-ing the oath being sworn in front of the SCC, but the law of the land is dictated by the Con-stitutional Declaration which stipulates this. It is built on precedent, for, in the absence of a president, the head of Parliament assumes the position and if there is none then it is the head of the SCC. So it is nothing new.”

Parliament, where Morsy’s party held more than 40 percent of seats, was dissolved on 14 June by the same court, which ruled that the law governing elections for a third of the seats in the lower house was unconstitutional. Media reported the Brothers were negotiating with

from the executive branch, personified by the Supreme Council of Armed Forces this past year, an ensuing spat with Parliament MPs cast aspersions on the dynamic between the Isla-mist bloc and the judiciary.

As the matter of the constitutionality of Par-liament went to court, there was an attempt by Parliament to pass a draft law governing the composition of the court itself.

The draft law, proposed by a Nour Party MP but advocated by the FJP, attempted to restruc-ture the composition of the SCC and included a contentious provision that would stipulate that, even with a court ruling that deemed Par-liament unconstitutional, the assembly could not be dissolved for four years.

The draft law was criticized as an attempt by Parliament to interfere in the judiciary as well as protect its status irrespective of the ruling, and potentially cause friction between the Muslim Brotherhood and the judiciary. The draft was later withdrawn.

“The draft law crossed certain boundaries and was obviously a veiled threat to the SCC against the dissolution of Parliament,” said Amin.

Many MPs had also been critical of Farouk Sultan, the head of the court, in his capacity as head of the Presidential Elections Commis-sion, which protected him from legal chal-lenges through Article 28 of the March 2011 Constitutional Declaration. The commission barred Brotherhood candidate Khairat al-Shat-er and Salafi Sheikh Hazem Salah Abu Ismail from the race. Shater was disqualified for unre-solved criminal convictions, while Abu Ismail was barred due to his late mother’s American citizenship.

Some see this friction between Islamists and the constitutional court as staged by the SCAF itself.

Ahmed Ezzat, a lawyer from the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression told Egypt Independent that the military council was attempting to bring the SCC, and the ju-diciary in general, onside in order to confer legitimacy on the military-run transitional period.

In addition to the dissolution of Parliament, a case regarding the potential dissolution of the Muslim Brotherhood itself and another regarding the suspension of parties illegally formed on religious grounds, are making their way through the courts.

The stream of criticism directed towards the judiciary prompted a furious outburst by the head of the Judges Club, Ahmed al-Zend, who called a press conference to respond to this criticism. He meted out some of his own, labeling the Brotherhood a banned group that was “exploiting the current chaos.”

“Zend’s comments were unacceptable, and he is considered one of the most important ju-dicial symbols related to the old regime. That’s why his comments were acerbic about the Brotherhood and the FJP because he considers them rivals. He does not represent the judicia-ry,” Amin said.

The SCC was created in 1979 as a replace-ment for the Supreme Court, created a decade earlier, in response to the need for a judicial authority to pronounce on the constitutional-ity of legislation. The court, whether in its current guise or former one, was declared by the 1971 Constitution to have the final say in the constitutionality of any laws passed, as well as being the arbiter be-tween different judicial bodies.■

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Morsy is requested to swear in as President before the Supreme Constitutional Court

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5News28 June 2012

In search for civilityLiberals lash out at Islamists but will SCAF save them?

By Sarah Carr and Mohamed Adam

he political landscape over the past few weeks has largely been de-scribed as divided among

an Islamist bloc, a military bloc and a third one that is rather un-defined.

The division was best mani-fested in the presidential runoff election, in which the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsy beat former air force commander Ahmed Shafiq. Amid the polariza-tion, many liberals came out vocif-erously against the Brotherhood, raising questions about whether they perceive the generals as their saviors from the Islamization of the state.

Members of the Free Egyptians, Democratic Front and Tagammu parties, as well as representatives from the Kefaya political move-ment, held a joint press confer-ence Saturday on the eve of the announcement of the presidential election result. The conference was held just one day after President-elect Mohamed Morsy, who re-signed from the Brotherhood after being elected president, pledged to work with all political groups if he was to become president.

Osama al-Ghazaly Harb, a for-mer member of the now-dissolved National Democratic Party and the founder of the Democratic Front Party, discussed what he called the Brotherhood’s attempts to “mo-nopolize” the revolution. Harb said the sit-in in Tahrir Square, which began after the runoff vote ended and comprised mostly Morsy supporters, reflects “a lack of trust and a desire to impose the result in advance.”

Free Egyptians Party leader Ahmed Saeed criticized groups that “attack [the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces] one day and make alliances with it the next, when they need it,” clearly refer-ring to the Brotherhood.

Although deeply rooted in the history of Egypt’s contentious politics, the liberal-Islamist split took a new turn following the 18-day uprising that toppled the rule of Hosni Mubarak.

The first public spat was over the March 2011 referendum on the Constitutional Declaration put forward by the military coun-cil, and the transitional road map which recommended holding par-liamentary elections before writing the constitution. Islamists favored this arrangement because they felt confident they would dominate parliamentary elections and it promised them potential control over the writing of the constitu-tion. Liberals opposed it.

Since then, liberals and secular groups have repeatedly accused Islamists of complicity with the military. Islamists responded in kind in November 2011 during the battle over a document drafted by former Vice Prime Minister Ali al-Selmy. This proposed a series of supra-constitutional principles that would have determined the civil nature of the state and pre-served the ruling generals’ pro-

tected position. But Bassel Adel, a member of the

Free Egyptians Party, rejected ac-cusations that liberals have come out in support of the military in their fight against a religious state.

“We’re fighting both religious and military fascism — we’re stuck between the lion’s jaws,” Adel said.

Adel added that the SCAF has a duty to protect the secular nature of the state, not in its capacity as the head of the military but as a body charged with administering the country’s affairs.

“We’re not throwing ourselves on the military, but rather affirm-ing the secular nature of the state and sending the message that there still exists a force in Egypt that in-sists on this secularism at a time when some liberals appeared in a press conference with the Brother-hood,” Adel said.

He said the Brotherhood rep-resented a threat to civil liberties, could drag the country into a reli-gious war, and posed a risk to eco-nomic and civil rights.

“There is no such thing as reas-surances from the Muslim Broth-ers, because for 84 years, they’ve been doing the opposite of what they say,” Adel said.

Former MP Mohamed Abu Hamed of the Free Egyptians Par-ty agreed. He has been at the front lines of the anti-Brotherhood in-

vective, posting statements on his Twitter account such as “Down with the Muslim Brotherhood, the shoes of America.”

Abu Hamed, who describes him-self as pro-revolution, attracted criticism both for these attacks and for his support of former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq for the presidency. Many members of rev-olutionary circles regard Shafiq as a symbol of the Mubarak regime.

The former MP has also de-fended the controversial Justice Ministry decree passed shortly before the election that gave mili-tary personnel the power to arrest civilians.

Abu Hamed told Egypt Indepen-dent that the decision “is aimed at protecting the country, because religious forces threatened chaos if the election result wasn’t to their liking. In addition, there are a huge

number of weapons in the country and so it was essential to have a law dealing with these threats.”

The Administrative Court halted the decree on Tuesday.

Like Adel, Abu Hamed said he believes Egyptian society faces the dual threat of military and religious oppression. Before the revolution, there was political repression but “no pressure on basic freedoms.”

“It was a choice between two dangers, and we chose what we regard as the lesser danger because the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafi state is the worst,” he said.

Writer and blogger Bassem Sa-bry suggested that liberals might indeed be seeking to weaken the Brotherhood’s public appeal, to-gether with the military council ahead of the formation the assem-bly that will write the new consti-tution, “for a possibly more secular outcome.” The current Constitu-ent Assembly is criticized for be-ing dominated by Islamists.

“It shows how desperate they are and how irreconcilable things with the Brotherhood currently are. And this is in some ways a point of no return in that relationship. They put all their bets on the SCAF,” Sabry said. “Of course, being this aligned means there is a price to pay in the end.”

Abu Hamed, meanwhile, said religious groups have misled the

public about the meaning of a ‘madaniya’ — a secular or civilian state.

“A ‘madaniya’ state means the op-posite of military [or] religious one, but the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis have selectively chosen to suggest that the danger is restricted to the existence of a military state so that everyone fights that,” Abu Hamed said. “The truth is, how-ever, that a religious state is more dangerous because Brotherhood and Salafi thought is extremist.”

But for Mohamed Naeem, a col-umnist and a member of the Social Democratic Party’s political bu-reau, there is no difference between religious and military fascism.

“We are before a power that is either military-religious and in which the military is dominant, or religious-military and in which the Brotherhood is dominant,” he said.

He said that if the liberals’ excuse for seeking recourse to the military council is minority freedoms, they should look to the Maspero events and “see what happened when a minority tried to express its free-dom, and the army crushed them with tanks.” Last October, a mostly Coptic march to the Maspero state TV building in Cairo was fiercely at-tacked, and 28 people died. Some of them had been run over by mili-tary vehicles.

“The army cannot protect the secular nature of the state, just the elite lifestyle that army members adopt. But the army would be un-able to do anything in poor areas if Salafis controlled them,” Naeem added.

For him, liberal forces are fight-ing imaginary battles.

“These forces aren’t even in the race for power, and for this reason their actions are determined by fear. Their position is of someone who behaves like he is outside the race for power,” Naeem said.

He added that liberals will only be able to compete if they have a strong social message.

“They won’t achieve anything if they carry on with this fear of the Brotherhood,” he said.■

[Liberal] forces aren’t even in the race for power, and for this reason their actions are determined by fear

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Naguib Sawiris with Saad Eddin Ibrahim at the liberal parties’ Saturday presser

Ahmed Saeed

Osama al-Ghazaly Harb

Mohamed Abu Hamed

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6 News28 June 2012

The media forms public opinion. You would have to be a saint not to be tempted by this power

By Heba Afify

ver the past year and a half, the same news an-chors were seen pleading with protesters in Tahrir

Square to let then-President Hosni Mubarak finish his term – then cel-ebrating his overthrow.

They revered protesters as free-dom fighters only to call them thugs on other occasions; they warned of conspiracies orches-trated by the Muslim Brotherhood and then congratulated the group’s presidential candidate, Mohamed Morsy, on winning the race against former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq.

Driven by the interests of its most-ly liberal owners, most of Egypt’s privately owned media sided with the old regime against the Brother-hood in the weeks leading up to the announcement of the next presi-dent, dropping the pro-revolution facade they had developed over the past year. With Morsy now official-ly ruling the country, another shift of bias should be expected.

Businessmen have the final word A small group of mostly liberal and often politicized businessmen con-trol most of Egypt’s private media, which developed over the last de-cade of Mubarak’s rule, as the re-gime loosened its iron grip over the airwaves and the printing houses.

These private newspapers and TV channels grew accustomed to dealing with political red lines, with some at times also playing an oppositional role. In the year and a half since the revolution began, they have continually shifted their biases in line with the changing balance of power, as they attempt to negotiate protecting their inter-ests while maintaining popularity.

“The media forms public opin-ion. You would have to be a saint not to be tempted by this power,” says Hisham Kassem, a longtime publisher.

Kassem says that for many busi-nessmen, the media can be used to settle old scores, bid for services that would advance their business and gain access to the government. Privately owned media in Egypt is only regulated by the investments law, with no laws to prevent the abuse or monopoly of media by businesses.

Private TV channels and papers are owned by wealthy men with liberal leanings who made fortunes in construction, real-estate, tele-communications and other indus-tries. Many also have ties to the old regime.

Kassem says the fact that most media outlets in Egypt are owned by wealthy individuals hurts inde-pendent and balanced reporting. Instead of pursuing stories objec-tively, media moguls see their en-terprises as tools to further their political agendas. Kassem is try-ing to start a publicly listed media company, with no one anchor in-vestor to avoid this problem.

The owners of newspapers or TV channels often become di-rectly involved in directing cover-age. Al-Dostour newspaper, which is owned by businessman Reda

Edward, waged a full-blown war against the Brotherhood after the announcement that Morsy would move to the runoff vote. Reda first emerged in the public sphere as the owner of the International BBC schools in the 1990s. He entered political life a decade later as a member of the Wafd Party.

The paper published unfounded accusations against the Brother-hood on a daily basis until the Is-lamist group pressed charges last week, when the paper published what it alleged was a transcript of a secret meeting at the Freedom and Justice Party headquarters.

The transcript ran under the headline, “The massacre of the cen-tury in Egypt,” with Al-Dostour ac-cusing the Brotherhood of plotting assassinations and an armed coup if Morsy lost.

Mohamed Faisal, Al-Dostour’s chief political editor, says that at-tacking the Muslim Brotherhood was a collective decision by edi-torial staff to oppose the group’s domination of politics.

“This was a paper policy. We took a stand against the domination of one [group] over the political scene, whoever that may be,” Faisal says.

Faisal says Edward interferes in the content of the paper and takes up issues with the editor-in-chief.

“Sometimes he’s convinced [by the editor] and sometimes he in-terferes,” Faisal says. “It’s between him and the editor-in-chief. We

find out the results later.”

Shifting biasesMany news outlets, such as the sat-ellite channels Al-Nahar, Al-Hayat and Al-Mehwar, intensified their at-tacks on Islamists, and openly sup-ported figures from the old regime in recent weeks. The trend has been especially dramatic at ONTV, which was previously considered the channel most supportive of the revolution.

As the race between Morsy and Shafiq heated up, the channel in-creasingly sided with Shafiq in its coverage. Ahead of the runoff, Naguib Sawiris, the telecom ty-coon who owns ONTV, said on his Twitter account that the race was a choice between a civil or religious state.

“They propagated the myth that the race is now between the civil and the religious state, when it is ac-tually between the revolution and the old regime,” says Wael Kandil, the managing editor of privately owned newspaper Al-Shorouk.

During the weeks leading up to

the runoff, the channel almost ex-clusively hosted Shafiq’s support-ers as guests. The liberal Islamist Wasat Party announced that the channel refused to host former Is-lamist MP Essam Sultan, and other anti-Shafiq figures were also alleg-edly banned from the channel.

An ONTV producer who prefers to remain anonymous says owners stood by their staff in the months following Mubarak’s resignation, when the channel was known to side with the revolution against the ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces. Despite the military council’s pressure on the anchors and owners, the producer says the management refused to interfere.

However, he says owners started interfering when the competition was perceived to be between civil and religious powers. Whether that pressure came from the military council or directly from the owners is something neither the producer nor experts can determine.

A new media empire? New outlets that emerged after the uprising have generated even more controversy.

Media mogul Mohamed al-Amin made his fortune in Kuwait, where he traveled to work as an architect before starting a contracting com-pany. Back in Egypt, Amin got in-volved in investments in partner-ship with Mansour Amer — who is also closely tied to figures from the Mubarak regime — until he en-tered the media arena in 2011.

Doubts were cast over the will of investors to pour money into a me-dia operation at a time when most capital was flying out of Egypt.

But Amin has since been in the process of building a media em-pire, spearheaded by CBC satellite channel and Al-Watan newspaper.

He has also acquired 85 percent of Al-Nahar channel in addition to drama and sports channels.

The aspiring media mogul has faced a host of accusations and ru-mors. Some have said he wants to bring back the Mubarak regime, while others say he receives secret foreign investments, or support from the Egyptian intelligence agencies.

Figures are not available, but the large volumes of money spent on all of Amin’s endeavors, from the high-quality paper used to print Al-Watan to the big names he has attracted to CBC, has helped fuel the rumors about Amin’s funding and agenda.

One journalist who did not want to be named says he became suspi-cious of the paper when Al-Watan offered him five times his current salary to leave his job at another leading paper to join Amin’s new project.

CBC’s main hosts are Lamees al-Hadidi and Khairy Ramadan, who both used to appear on state-owned channels. The programming has been virulently anti-Islamist. Hadidi often goes on anti-Islamist rants, and most of the guests have anti-Islamist inclinations.

Kassem says that, regardless of the rumors, Amin’s new promi-nence in the media is dangerous.

“Concentrating the media in the hands of individuals can make us long for the days of state media af-ter a while,” says Kassem.

He says that while state media propagates one misleading but homogeneous discourse, having a handful of businessmen with con-flicting interests using their media to propagate contradictory mes-sages and manipulate public opin-ion can be even more harmful and could lead to the disintegration of the information system as a whole.

Kassem says the only explanation for Amin’s lack of regard for profits is that he is after political power, just like all the other businessmen involved in media projects.

What now?With the election of Morsy as president and the ruling military council remaining hugely influ-ential, Egypt’s private media now faces the unprecedented situation of having more than one political power center.

Most media outlets seem to be in a wait-and-see phase in which they are wary but not as staunchly critical of the Brotherhood as they were.

CBC has made space for Isla-mist guests since Morsy’s win. Such guests had been scarce in the run-up to the elections runoff. But the channel still raises suspicions and criticisms of the Brotherhood throughout its shows. Al-Watan newspaper simply listed Morsy’s promises and instructed the read-ers to keep a copy to make sure they held the new president ac-countable.

“The revolution hasn’t reached the media yet in a real way,” Kandil says. “It will take time be-fore the media starts to be ruled by objectivity rather than per-sonal interests.”■

Yesterday’s newsMedia moguls struggle to keep their biases in check

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7News28 June 2012

By Lina AttalahIn a fictional scoop, the daily news-paper Al-Dostour revealed last Thursday a nefarious plot by the Muslim Brotherhood to dismantle the state.

Al-Dostour renewed its smear campaign the following Tuesday af-ter Brotherhood presidential candi-date Mohamed Morsy’s victory was announced, saying the armed forces opted for a Morsy win because his loss would stir a long and dangerous cycle of violence.

The Sinai Peninsula plays an im-portant part in all of these supposed scoops. According to Al-Dostour, if Morsy lost, armed Islamist groups in Sinai would facilitate the entry of gunmen from Hamas, the neigh-boring Islamist authority in Gaza. These gunmen would then embark on a series of attacks to destabilize the country and destroy the state.

The Sinai scare is not limited to Egyptian media though. Across Si-nai’s eastern border, Israeli media sounded similar alarms about the growing terrorist presence in the peninsula. Media reported Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak warn-ing Morsy of further attacks target-ing Israel from Sinai at a meeting on Monday.

Columnist Ron Ben-Yishai wrote for the Israeli website Ynet that the Bedouins of Sinai hold “huge de-pots of heavy machine guns, RPG rockets and launchers of all types, anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, as well as advanced Grad rockets and worse.” He suggested they were “getting training from Palestinian terrorists from Gaza as well as from Global Jihad members.”

But inside Sinai’s mainland, the scare is dismissed. “We can’t say there are serious fears of an Islamic insurgency in Sinai,” General Sherif Ismail, a security adviser for North Sinai Governorate, told Egypt Inde-pendent. “Israel, like many parties, has a vested interest in making up dangers in Sinai.”

Ismail said Islamist groups were monitored in North and central Si-nai, and limited to the desert, where they have not been able to flour-ish due to security forces. “If the situation is as bad as the media is portraying, you’d find these groups operating freely in cities,” he said. “They are not.”

Aref Abu Atta, the sheikh of the Akkour tribe in the North Sinai town of Sheikh Zuwayed, agrees. He said the scattered radical groups, some of which focus more on preaching than militancy, have been mostly formed and inspired by elements from out-side Sinai, particularly leaders of Is-lamist groups in Upper and Lower Egypt who detainees from Sinai meet in prisons. Hundreds of Bed-ouins were thrown in jail after a se-ries of terrorist attacks rocked Sinai between 2004 and 2006. Another group of outsiders comes from Gaza

through tunnels, Abu Atta said.There are an estimated 1,200 tun-

nels between the North Sinai town of Rafah and Gaza, which are used primarily for smuggling goods, but also sometimes for people. The tun-nels were dug as a reaction to the blockade imposed by Israel and aided by Egypt since Hamas took power there in 2007.

On Sunday, infiltrators reportedly belonging to Hamas clashed with of-ficers from the rival Fatah group in Arish, North Sinai’s capital. Injuries occurred on both sides, but no one was killed. About 350 officers who worked with Fatah’s leader in Gaza, Mohamed Dahlan, moved to Egypt in 2007 following Hamas’ takeover, one of Dahlan’s officers told Egypt Independent last year. Dahlan him-self has repeatedly been accused of working with radical groups op-posed to Hamas in a quest to weak-en it.

Ismail believes anti-Hamas radical groups are the primary militants in the peninsula. References by secu-rity were made to such groups on different occasions, including when attackers from Sinai crossed into southern Israel and killed eight Is-raelis last year.

“That’s why the tunnels issue needs to be resolved once and for all,” said Atta. In 2009, Egypt started building a censor-equipped under-ground wall to stop the use of tun-nels, a project which has stopped.

For Atta, the image of a proliferat-ing Islamist militancy comes from an increase in inter-tribal violence and the settling of old feuds between Sinai residents and security forces. Indeed, most recent incidents of unrest in Sinai, from road blockings to the kidnappings of tourists, are perpetrated by detainees’ relatives to pressure security forces to release them.

The only incidents that could in-dicate the involvement of radical

groups are the rockets fired from Sinai to Israel in April and June, and the blowing up of a pipeline supply-ing gas to Israel — an incident that has been repeated 13 times since last year.

Hassan Ali, a member of the promi-nent Sawarka tribe who fought in the Egypt-Israel War of Attrition, says he thinks these radical groups can do very little, but their eradication will demand a more robust security pres-ence. “The [peace treaty with Israel] has to change to allow for a stronger military presence in Sinai,” he said. “If these groups are a real threat, then they will easily be ended through a military operation.”

But Israel has voiced vehement opposition to any suggestion that the peace accords, which place limi-tations on the presence of Egyptian troops near the border, may change.

Security forces say they are taking care of the job. Ismail said security is being restored through two main av-enues: ending past disputes between the people of Sinai and the police, and changing police behavior.

Settling past disputes entailed is-suing amnesties for some 163 con-victs in trials related to drug trading and smuggling. Ismail added that another 157 cases are also await-ing amnesties, pending a security review. “We are working constantly

with the sheikhs to return security to Sinai,” Ismail said.

People in Sinai, meanwhile, be-lieve any meaningful stability will have to involve their collaboration. “The people of Sinai are capable of standing against any Islamist group if it would endanger the area,” Atta said confidently.

Mussad Abu Fagr, a prominent blogger from Sinai jailed by Hosni Mubarak’s regime for his criticism of the peninsula’s marginalization, agrees that Sinai can withstand po-tential threats.

“We are able to protect ourselves. Indeed, the state has done very little to protect Sinai. Only its people stand against all the dangers,” he said.

Abu Fagr does not find the Isla-mist presence in Sinai worrying. And with just a few sporadic groups, he doesn’t think the Brotherhood’s ascension to power will embolden them significantly, as others have suggested.

“The Brothers could make use of some of the religious groups here to widen their support base ahead of elections or control the street. But they won’t allow these groups to at-tack Israel, because they are prag-matic,” he said.

The real danger in Sinai for Abu Fagr is not Islamist groups, but any attempt to curb the quest for de-mocracy that the Egyptian revolu-tion has brought about.

“The tribes here don’t buy much into the Brothers’ discourse. They need to be part of the decision-making process. And that’s the only way to imagine a peaceful Si-nai,” he said.■

The Brothers could make use of some of thereligious groups here to widen their support base or control the street. But they won’t allow these groups to attack Israel, because they are pragmatic

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An imaginary scareEgyptian and Israeli media cite Sinai’s militant groups as a huge threat. Are they?

Security forces keep a close eye on the Sinai peninsula

8 World Briefs28 June 2012

Libya extradition peeves Tunisian president

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir announced Sunday that Su-dan is not experiencing an uprising that is part of the so-called Arab Spring, after nine days of nation-wide protests in his country. “The people who burn tires are small in number and they are pushing for a fight,” he said. Protests began 18 June after Bashir announced a new set of austerity measures, including phasing out fuel subsidies, to make up for a massive budget deficit. Bashir said he is still popular and rode around the capital in an open car. “When the people saw me, they shouted ‘God is great’,” Bashir said. The protests began with students but have since spread to other sectors. Police have cracked down heavily on the protests, beat-ing and shooting tear gas toward scores of demonstrators.■

Tunisian President Moncef al-Marzouki on Sunday called the extradition of ex-Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi’s former prime minister to Libya “illegal,” attack-ing his country’s Islamist prime minister. Marzouki’s office released a statement denouncing Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali’s decision to extradite Baghdadi al-Mahmoudi, the Qadhafi-era prime minister. Marzouki said the decision had been made without consulting him. “The extradition decision, signed by the head of the Tunisian govern-ment, constitutes a clear violation of our country’s international com-mitments and those towards the [United Nations],” the statement said. Earlier Sunday, a spokesperson for Jebali told the news agency AFP that Mahmoudi had been extradited, despite protests from his lawyers and rights groups that he faces execu-tion back in Libya. Mahmoudi, who served as Qadhafi’s prime minister from 2006 until the final days of his regime, fled to Tunisia last Septem-ber shortly after rebel fighters took the capital Tripoli.■

Omar al-Bashir

Moncef al-Marzouki

Jacob Zuma

Well-respected liberal economist Yan-nis Stournaras was appointed Greece’s new finance minister Tuesday after the resignation of the government’s first choice for the job at a crucial moment for the debt-laden country. The new conservative-led government scram-bled to decide on a replacement after banker Vassilis Rapanos quit Monday, heeding doctors’ advice after spending four days in the hospital with dizziness and abdominal pains. Greece is weeks away from running out of cash and in desperate need of a minister to lead ne-gotiations with lenders, party officials said. The three ruling coalition leaders quickly agreed to appoint Stournaras, 55, who is nicknamed “Mr. Euro” in Greece. Stournaras is expected to push for more time and money from skepti-cal foreign lenders while coaxing reluc-tant officials at home to push through unpopular austerity measures.■

South Africa needs a “dramatic shift” to address the wealth imbalance in favor of the country’s majority black population, President Jacob Zuma said Tuesday. South Africa’s economy is still largely under the control of the white minority that held power under the apartheid regime. “The ownership of the economy is still primarily in the hands of white males, as it has always been,” Zuma said. Calls for economic reforms to address inequality have been a staple of the ruling African Na-tional Congress party’s strategy docu-ments for years, and Zuma’s speech comes months before he will seek re-election as leader of the faction-ridden movement in December. He has also been facing demands from the party’s youth wing to nationalize mines and seize white-owned farmland. Nearly half of South Africa’s population lives in poverty. About 29 percent of blacks are unemployed, compared with 5.9 percent of whites.■

Burmese democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi visited Paris on Tuesday for the final leg of a European tour on which she was hailed as a powerful symbol of peaceful defiance to dictatorship. The 67-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner was freed from nearly two decades of house arrest in November 2010 and became a lawmaker earlier this year as part of a gradual transition toward de-mocracy in the Southeast Asian nation that had been governed by a military junta. Suu Kyi also visited London and Switzerland. She delivered her Nobel Peace Prize speech in Oslo on 16 June, 21 years after winning the award while under house arrest. She pledged to keep up her struggle for democracy.■

Greece gets ‘Mr. Euro’

Land reform in South Africa

Burma’s Suu Kyi wraps up historic tour

Israel began to evict Jewish settlers from an outpost on Palestinian soil Tuesday after the country’s high court deemed their homes illegal. The settlement housed 30 families, who were transferred to tempo-rary homes elsewhere in the West Bank with the help of the Defense Ministry. The court ordered the demolition of the homes, located in a neighborhood of the Beit El

settlement, because they were built on pri-vate Palestinian land. Three other families living in mobile homes on the land were also ordered to move. The demolition is scheduled to take place before 1 July. An agreement reached last week between the settlers and the government ensured a peaceful eviction in return for Israel con-structing 300 new homes in Beit El.■

Syrian defections

Thirty-three members of Syria’s military defected Monday, Turkish officials said. The defectors included three colonels, the officials said. Five days earlier, a Syrian pilot defected and flew his plane to Jordan. Thousands of soldiers in President Bashar al-Assad’s army have defected since the up-rising against his regime began there more

than a year ago. Most of them are low-level conscripts and have joined the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group fighting his regime. The reported defectors in Turkey came just days after Syrian forces shot down a Turk-ish plane in Syrian territory, increasing tensions between the two countries.■

Israel evacuates part of a settlement

Sudanese president: ‘No Arab Spring’

Bahrain charges police for murdersBahrain said Tuesday that three police of-ficers who face charges of killing demonstra-tors during protests last year will face murder charges and could face the death penalty. The defendants, who were not named, in-clude a police lieutenant, a statement by the Gulf country’s Information Affairs Authority said. They were originally being tried on the lesser charge of manslaughter. They are

on trial for three separate shooting deaths that occurred in February and March of 2011. The officers’ trial resumes 10 July. In a related development, authorities said they have begun giving compensation to families of people killed during the uprising. At least 50 people have been killed since the uprising demanding greater political rights began last year. Protests continue almost daily.■

Turkey bombs Kurds in IraqThe Turkish military carried out airstrikes on nine Kurdish targets deep into northern Iraq between 22 and 24 June, just days after severe clashes on the other side of the border, the Turkish military announced Tuesday. Most of the targets were in the Qandil region and were hideouts of fight-ers from the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK. Kurdish fighters killed one policeman and wounded three others in a roadside bombing inside Turkey on Sunday near the

town of Derik in Mardin province. Turkish soldiers and Kurdish fighters clashed last week in one the most intense battles of the conflict this year, with about 30 combatants killed in fighting at army outposts in south-east Turkey. PKK fighters had launched simultaneous dawn attacks on three military observation points in Hakkari province near Turkey’s mountainous border with Iraq on Tuesday, killing eight soldiers and wound-ing 19.■

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An Israeli settlement

Syrian president meets with government officials

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9World28 June 2012

It is ironic that Israel is insisting that refugees should be repatriated. It is the same state that has statedconsistently thatPalestinian refugees don’t have the right to return to their homes

Authorities havereportedly rejected all but eightof the 4,178 asylumapplications…a rejection rate of over 99.9 percent

South Sudanese migrants deported from Israel

A South Sudanese migrant waves his flag on way to Ben Gurion airport for deportation

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was a lot of pressure involved, as hun-dreds of South Sudanese reported to the UNHCR in Tel Aviv over recent months. Pressures include the revo-cation of visas previously renewable every four months to stay and work, arrests and detentions, and a general feeling of lack of safety and future for these migrants in Israel, according to Tall.

Israel’s Interior Ministry decided in January 2012 to reduce the number of African migrants in Israel, and set a date of 1 April for the South Suda-nese to leave. A group of Israeli NGOs filed a court appeal, which was reject-ed by an Israeli court in early June on the grounds that no proof had been presented that the South Sudanese “would be in physical danger if they returned home.”

After the court ruling rejected the South Sudanese appeal on 7 June, the deportations began to proceed very quickly.

Though those scheduled to leave were promised a week to wrap up their personal affairs in Israel, the “Oz” immigration unit began mak-ing arrests after three days. The first repatriation flight took place just ten days later.

After the arrival of the first repa-triation flight in Juba, some of the passengers spoke to the media and complained about having been treated as “criminals,” threatened, summarily thrown in jail, and having their permits to be in Israel summar-ily revoked.

AFP reported that one of those on board the first repatriation flight, Mayuol Juac, 30, who had worked as

a waiter in Eilat and Tel Aviv for five years, was arrested three months pri-or to the flight, and then imprisoned on suspicion of being illegal. His visa was confiscated and he was pressured to leave. “They took it from me and they said: ‘You have just one week to leave, one week to leave the country!’ Those without papers were arrested and put in jail until their deportation. Then it is from jail to the airport to Juba,” Juac said.

One South Sudanese govern-ment official in Tel Aviv for the first repatriation flight said his compa-triots “would be welcomed back as economic assets,” Reuters reported — and he said that most of those returned would “leave voluntarily” with a free air trip, and an Israeli grant of 1,000 euros per adult plus 300 eu-ros for each child with them.

Chris Lom of the Geneva-based International Organization for Mi-gration (IOM) which helps deal with non-voluntary repatriations, told Egypt Independent that the South Sudanese government asked his or-ganization to give assistance, so most of those on board would be headed to an IOM transit camp in Juba.

Lom’s organization is helping with shelter and transportation. “Obvi-ously it depends on their final desti-nation,” he said, but those returned were welcome to join the convoys that IOM runs in the South Sudanese Provinces of Eastern and Western Equatoria.

“The problem in Israel is that there is no refugee legislation. Lack of leg-islation, proper institutions and ex-pertise makes verifying the refugee

claims very hard,” said Mazen Masri, a Palestinian lawyer. He added that in 2012, the Israeli Knesset amended the 1954 Infiltration Prevention Law to make it more effective in deporting African refugees.

“This law was first enacted in 1954 to facilitate the deportations of Pales-tinian refugees who were expelled in 1948 and were trying to return back to their homes,” Masri said.

“In this context it is ironic that Is-rael is insisting that refugees should be repatriated. It is the same state that has said consistently that Palestinian refugees don’t have the right to return to their homes and lands, which are now under its control. Israel is apply-ing a double standard here.”

Most of the African non-Jewish migrants arrived in Israel through the Sinai, after spending time in Egypt where they were also not welcome. They paid Bedouin traffickers to help them cross the Sinai, where Egyptian forces shot and killed dozens of these African migrants. The problem has

increased in recent years, as traffickers discovered that holding the migrants for ransom — under threat of death, and in conditions of physical depriva-tion, punishment and sexual assault — was more profitable than simply guiding them across the desert.

Tall said that the Israeli Govern-ment is now trying “to satisfy the pub-lic appetite for deportation,” which he believes was sparked by recent ac-cusations [in May] of sexual assaults by Eritreans in Tel Aviv, exacerbated by the concentration of Africans in Tel Aviv and Eilat.

Human Rights Watch reported that Interior Minister Eli Yishai told Israe-li Army Radio in May that most Afri-can migrants were involved in crimi-nal activities and should be jailed. Yishai claimed that “there are a lot of women in Tel Aviv who have been raped [by African migrants] but are afraid to complain so that they don’t get stigmatized as AIDS carriers”.

According to Masri, a few factors could explain the Israeli decision to return migrants.

There is “the increase in the num-ber of refugees, which the Israeli government started to think of as a demographic threat. Israel sees any significant presence of non-Jews as a threat to the demographic composi-tion of the country. Israel’s popula-tion is currently 75.5 percent Jewish, 20.5 percent Palestinian, and 4 per-cent non-Jews who are not Palestin-ian. This obsession with demography and Jewish majority has been part of Israeli politics and policies that date back even to the stage before the cre-ation of the state in 1948.”

Masri added that, under a right wing government, Israel thrives “on nurturing a sense of being under constant threat. Those dealing with the threats (actual or perceived) present themselves as national he-roes who saved the country.” Also in the context of right wing politics, Masri sees the recent deportations as part of a competition between dif-ferent political players. “By initiat-ing the deportation campaign, some figures in the government, mainly Yishai, hope to garner more support from residents of those areas. This partially explains the ultra-nation-alist and racist propaganda that ac-companies this campaign.”■

Additional reporting by Lina Attalah

Back to the homelandIs Israel’s policy of returning Africans deportation in disguise?

By Marian Houk

srael carried out its first airlift in mid-June to repatriate some 120 South Sudanese migrants, who were described by the government as “returning vol-

untarily.”Officially, this airlift was carried out

as an assisted voluntary return and re-integration, agreed to bilaterally at the highest levels of the Israeli and South Sudanese governments, according to media sources. The deal was finalized during a recent visit of the president of South Sudan to Israel.

“People are not being deported... We have agreed with the Israeli gov-ernment for our people to be peace-fully and voluntarily repatriated,” South Sudan’s Minister of Humani-tarian Affairs Joseph Lual Achuil told AFP news agency, when the first air-lift from Tel Aviv landed at Juba air-port on 18 June.

Four representatives of the South Sudanese government flew to Israel to oversee the first repatriation flight — and returned home on board the same plane.

More repatriation flights are taking off this week from Tel Aviv to Juba, involving between 2,000 and 3,000 migrants.

According to Sigal Rozen, who works with the Israeli Hotline for Migrant Workers, migrants to be re-turned are currently in the Saharonim facility in the Negev, near Ketziot. These include South Sudanese who have refused to leave voluntarily, “ei-ther because their employers owe them a large sum of money which they wish to recover, or because they have children here,” according to Rozen.

One of the South Sudanese offi-cials who came to Israel for the first flight told Reuters that he believed only a few South Sudanese scheduled for the weekly flights may resist repa-triation — but he added that Israel promised a hearing of these cases by humanitarian authorities.

However, these humanitarian au-thorities are part of the Israeli Interi-or Ministry’s department for refugee protection — the same ministry that has ordered the departures. These au-thorities have reportedly rejected all but eight of the 4,178 asylum applica-tions that have been considered in the two years since it began operating, ac-cording to a report by the Hotline for Migrant Workers — a rejection rate of over 99.9 percent.

According to the hotline, Israel del-egated the role of dealing with asy-lum seekers to the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees until 2008, when it started conducting the process itself. Rozen also said that the Israeli Interior Ministry deports several thousand people every year, hence the recent returns campaign is not new.

William Tall, UNHCR representa-tive in Tel Aviv, told Egypt Indepen-dent that thus far his organization has not been involved in the airlifts because “we don’t agree with the pro-cess.”

According to him, individuals who have applied for asylum or refugee cases should not be detained, but should be free while their cases are being considered. While the flights returning the South Sudanese involve those who have technically agreed to leave on a voluntary basis, the return “cannot be considered completely voluntary,” Tall said, because there

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10 Economy28 June 2012

sures Egypt’s trade with the rest of the world, is also running on empty.

�e de�cit rose to $11 billion in the �rst nine months of the 2011/12 �scal year, double the previous year’s levels, as in�ows of capital from tourists and foreign investors went dry.

Egypt is still raising money through selling dollar-denominated treasury bills and bonds to local banks, but at very high interest rates re�ecting investors’ low con�dence .

“For the last two days, it has �oated bonds at an interest rate of 14.7 percent. Spain, at the height of its crisis, was selling bonds at 8.6 per-cent and analysts freaked out,” Ississ said.

Some deals are still being made, though, that will help the government pay for $1.7 billion of foreign debts due for repayment next month.

�is month, it is expected to get between $1 billion and $2 billion from the sale of local mobile telephone operator Mobinil to France Telecom. And recently, a group of investors that includes the government announced it had secured a $3.7 billion loan for the con-struction of an oil re�nery.

Less purchasing powerWhile these deals provide some measure of optimism, it is dampened by the threat of sharp currency devaluation, which would trigger in�ation and higher food import prices. Egypt is the world’s largest importer of wheat.

�e Central Bank of Egypt has been using its foreign reserves to prop up the currency by selling dollars to support the pound. In do-ing so, its reserves have fallen from $36 billion early last year to $15.5 billion as of the end of May, which covers a li�le more than three months of imports.

Should reserves fall below this level, the cen-

‘No man’s land’ SCAF’s political maneuvers might be destroying the economy, analysts say

By Nadine Marroushi

Egypt’s stock market soared on Mon-day following news that Mohamed Morsy was the winner of the presiden-tial election. �e small amount of po-

litical certainty was enough to bring the mar-ket up 7.6 percent in a single day, making the Egyptian market one of the best performers in the world. �e good news may be temporary, though.

Analysts say that the ruling military junta has put Egypt into an extended period of politi-cal uncertainty, placing an already weakened economy on even shakier grounds.

“We’ve evaporated into an unknown terri-tory of a no man’s land. �e recovery process is uncertain, and I’m quite worried about where Egypt is headed,” said Mohamad al-Ississ, an assistant economics professor at the American University of Cairo.

A few days before the second round of the presidential election was due to begin, a court dissolved Parliament, deeming it unconstitu-tional. At that point, it was the only democrati-cally elected institution in the post-25 January transitional phase.

And on the eve of the second day of voting, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces is-sued a constitutional addendum weakening the powers of the president and giving new powers to the army, including legislative re-sponsibilities until a new Parliament is elected and the right to form an assembly to write a new constitution if the current one fails.

�e day a�er the military council’s an-nouncement, Egypt’s stock exchange lost nearly LE1.6 billion of its market capital with-in the �rst minutes of trading, based on fears of political turmoil.

Fitch Ratings, the credit rating agency, downgraded Egypt’s sovereign credit rating to B-plus from BB-minus with a negative outlook on news of Parliament’s dissolution, suggest-ing further downgrades could be expected.

�e SCAF’s moves place the balance of power in the hands of an unelected military body, contrary to the expected transition to an elected civilian government with legislative powers by the end of June.

“�is extends the period of uncertainty by another six months in terms of the constitu-tion and next Parliament. �at’s unfortunate for Egypt, because local investment remains lower than it might be and there will be delays on big investments,” said Angus Blair, chair-man of the Signet Institute, a Cairo-based think tank.

Hassan Malek, head of the recently formed Egyptian Business Development Association and a Muslim Brotherhood businessman, agreed.

“Investors will continue to lack con�dence in the market, especially when the judiciary is seen to be unstable in its decision making. �is doesn’t create a climate for investment. Instead, it creates a lot of anxiety. �e court rulings are irresponsible. We were looking to the elections to create some stability,” he said.

A tight belt on a hungry waistEgypt’s economy is su�ering from a high budget de�cit, balance of payments crisis and looming currency devaluation, all of which place it in a di�cult position to meet the social justice demands of the revolution.

�ese include higher spending on health and education, implementing minimum and maximum wages, higher salaries for public sector employees, reforming an unfair and very expensive fuel subsidies system, and cre-ating jobs for the more than 3 million unem-ployed — the majority of whom are under the age of 30.

Investors, including multilateral institutions like the International Monetary Fund, had been looking to the election as an indicator that the country was heading towards stability.

Dispersing a US$3.2 billion emergency

budget support facility from the IMF had been dependent on securing political consen-sus over next year’s budget between the Isla-mist-led Parliament and the SCAF-appointed government.

�e future of the loan, though, now remains uncertain, as the 2012/13 budget has been ap-proved only by the ruling military leaders.

�e facility was still seen as small compared to the $11 billion worth of investments that the Finance Ministry said was required to implement economic reforms. But it was also considered the nod of con�dence needed for foreign investors to stave o� a currency crisis.

�e budget de�cit rose to an estimated 9.38 percent in the 2011/12 �scal year, up from an estimated 8.5 percent in 2010/11.

Egypt could still receive budget support from donors less concerned about democracy, such as the Gulf states. In June, Saudi Arabia donated $1.5 billion for the budget. SCAF also invested $2 billion from its own unac-countable funds into the central bank last year to prop up dwindling foreign reserves.

But multilateral loans, such as those from the World Bank — which would have gone to job-creation projects — are understood to be on hold.

Sources at the European Bank for Recon-struction and Development, which had been looking to invest around $250 million by Sep-tember in the private sector, also said they are “examining the implications of recent events.”

Parliament had needed to ratify two articles of the bank’s charter before it could start in-vesting. �e bank had expected this to happen in the summer.

Short on funds�e balance of payments account, which mea-

tral bank will have no more ammunition to defend the pound, investors say.

“�e major point now is if Egyptians them-selves will put pressure on the pound by dumping it in favor of other currencies, like the dollar,” Said Hirsh, a market economist with the London-based consultancy Capital Economics, said.

“Assuming Egypt receives no major help from outside, devaluation of the currency can be expected in three to four months from now,” he added.

On 21 June, Capital Economics released a statement saying the pound’s one-year non-deliverable forwards rose from 7.5 per dollar to 7.9 per dollar, suggesting that the market expects a 30 percent devaluation over the next year.

“With political conditions deteriorating, the risk of a disorderly devaluation — where the pound falls by 50 percent or more — is rising,” it added.

�is will lead to a vicious cycle of instability feeding on a worsening economic situation, Ississ said.

Higher prices of basic goods, such as food and fuel, are o�en accompanied by riots, as was the case in the 1970s when then-President Anwar Sadat tried to li� food subsidies, and more recently when food prices skyrocketed across the world in 2008 to 2009. Sudan’s cur-rent unrest is linked to the regime’s a�empt to li� fuel subsidies.

Political legitimacy neededInvestors and market reactions to the SCAF’s political maneuvering reinforce the notion that democracy is good for the economy.

“A proper democratic process is the only real system that inspires con�dence,” Hirsh said.

Having a Parliament means there is an elected body capable of passing legislation with some measure of political consensus and legitimacy, which is important when making economic decisions that could raise the price of goods or increase debt, but this no longer exists.

�e potential that the SCAF is headed to-ward a protracted political con�ict with the Muslim Brotherhood means it will take longer to restore trust in the stability of the system. �ose who had been willing to inject much-needed cash into the country will continue to take a wait-and-see a�itude, pushing the coun-try further into crisis.

“If we, the people living in the country, are confused, how can we expect people abroad to jump in and take part in building the country, whether through tourism or investments?” said Nagla Rizk, an associate professor at AUC’s economics department.

Capital Economics issued a strongly worded statement on 18 June telling investors to be concerned about the heightened political risk and potential for ensuing social unrest that “in the extreme could lead to a second revolu-tion.”

“�ere is no good story in any place when a military is ruling the country,” Hirsh said.■

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SCAF members

Cairo stock market

Investors will continue to lack confidence in the market, especially when the judiciary is seen to beunstable in its decision-making

There is no good story in any place when a military is ruling the country,

Moh

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11Economy Briefs28 June 2012

Stock exchange likes Morsy

Stocking up on wheat

The Egyptian Stock Exchange surged by 7.6 percent on Monday after Islamist presidential candi-date Mohamed Morsy was declared president-elect a week after the ballots were cast, putting an end to uncertainty over the result. The market had tumbled over the course of the presidential elec-tion over fears the vote would be derailed or marred by violence, but

voting and the announcement of the result passed peacefully. Later in the day, trading was suspended for half an hour after share prices continued to soar to 6.7 percent, in line with stock market rules. Among the most heavily traded stocks were Orascom Telecom Me-dia and Technology, up 5.2 percent, and Orascom Construction, which gained 7.9 percent.■

Egypt’s strategic wheat stockpiles total 5 million metric tons, enough to cover the country’s needs for six months, the state-run Middle East News Agency reported Monday, cit-ing Supply Minister Gouda Abdel Khaleq. The Finance Ministry allo-cated LE8.5 billion, or US$1.4 billion, for the purchase of wheat from local farmers. An increase in the quantity and quality of the domestic wheat harvest decreased dependence on imported grain and eased pressure on the budget, Abdel Khaleq added.

Egypt is the world’s largest buyer of wheat. It has imported between 10

and 11 million tons of wheat annual-ly for the past three years, according to International Grains Council data. The state grain buyer is the General Authority for Supply Commodities.

In early June, Soyuz Commodities, which has links to Moscow’s state grain exporter, won recognition as an official supplier to Egypt, posi-tioning it to become a major player in the grain markets. According to the International Grains Council’s May report, in 2011/12 Russia is forecast to be the world’s third larg-est wheat exporter behind the US and Australia.■

Cairo stock exchange

Wheat being harvested

Coptic businessman stays put

Talaat Mostafa Group resists

Billionaire businessman Naguib Sawiris has denied rumors that he would leave the country if an Islamist president came to power. “I will never flee Egypt and I will stay to fight the religious state and demand a civil one,” Sawiris told Al-Arabiya, a Sau-di-owned television channel. He refuted claims that several Coptic businessmen had already left Egypt for fear of persecution at the hands of the coming regime. “This is a rumor. No Christian or Muslim business-men have left Egypt. It is not logical that somebody with an established business would leave just because one candidate or another won the elections.”

Sawiris was critical of the Muslim Brotherhood’s claim to victory prior to the official announcement of results. When asked about the potential for liberal forces to unite in order to fight attempts to estab-lish a religious state, Sawiris said this was unlikely. “I doubt that liberal forces will be able to unite. In fact, I envy the Muslim Brotherhood for how organized and united they are,” he said.

Sawiris entered politics after Hosni Mubarak’s downfall in early 2011, when he founded the Free Egyptians Party. He stirred controversy last year amongst Isla-mists and revolutionaries when he posted a picture on his Twitter account of the car-toon characters Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse dressed in Islamic garb, which was deemed offensive.■

The Talaat Mostafa construction group is ap-pealing a court ruling to imprison its board director Tarek Talaat Mostafa, the company said on 25 June. The case was raised by a purchasers of one of the group’s residential units, who has refused to pay for six months’ worth of payment installments. The group said that it would not apply the initial court ruling and it had no basis in law. The case is set to be revisited on 30 June.

The Talaat Mostafa Group is one of the largest conglomerates in Egypt. Tarek Talaat Mostafa was a member of the National Democratic Party and head of Parliament’s housing committee during Hosni Mubarak’s regime. He is accused of financial corrup-tion, though an Alexandria court last year refused to ban him from running in Parlia-mentary elections.■

Naguib Sawiris

Tarek Talaat Mostafa

Pound in the doldrums The Egyptian pound weakened to its lowest level against the US dollar in more than seven years on 24 June as the coun-try waited for the presidential elections’ result. The pound reached a low of of 6.05 to the dollar, its weakest since 30 December 2004. “It is definitely because of the uncertain-ty surrounding the election results,” a currency dealer at a Cairo-based bank said. “I think there is a lot of panic among

local customers.” The cost of insuring Egypt’s debt against default also jumped to its highest in three and a half years last week after allegations of fraud delayed the announcement of the result. The dissolution earlier this month of an elected parliament has also alarmed investors, who fear Egypt will hurtle towards a balance of payments crisis and currency col-lapse.■

Land for tourism investment Minister of Tourism Mounir Fakhry Abdel Nour has said his ministry is prepared to sell land to foreigners interested in investing in the Red Sea, Ain Sokhna, the North Coast and South Sinai, according to business newspaper Al-Alam Al-Youm. He said that there was interest from Arab and Euro-pean businessmen to start investing in the coming period, particularly after the political outlook stabilizes.

Tareq Saadeldine, head of the Tourism Development Au-thority, said that the authority has specified 28 million me-ters of land for investment. The Authority has already met with French and Italian investors looking to build world-class tourist resorts, especially for yachts and health tourism, worth LE3 billion. Sale of land to foreigners is currently il-legal.■

Egypt’s economic growth will slow to under 2 percent this year from 2.5 percent last year because of political turmoil, the country’s central bank governor said on Sunday.

“We have a revolution,” Farouk al-Okdah told Reuters when asked why growth was slowing down.

Okdah was speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of officials from the Arab Monetary Fund and central banks in the region.

In April, the International Monetary Fund forecast Egypt’s gross domestic product growth would slow to 1.5 percent in 2012 from the 1.8 percent it estimated for 2011.■

2012 slowdown

Farouk al-Okdah

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The Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) said on Sunday it was arranging a US$65 mil-lion credit facility for Egypt to help the country trade with other Arab states, as political instability threatens Cairo with a balance of payments crisis.

The credit line will be extended through a trade financing program run by the AMF, central banks and other financial institu-tions in the region, said the multilateral lending body composed of 22 member countries.

Egypt’s balance of payments deficit ballooned to $11 billion in the first nine months of the 2011/12 fiscal year, more than double the levels of a year ago, as inflows of capital largely dried up.

Cairo is seeking aid from a wide range of international donors. Egyptian officials said in February they had asked for $500 million each from the AMF and the Afri-can Development Bank, $1 billion from the World Bank and $660 million from the European Union. But aid has generally been slow to arrive, partly because donors have been cautious about lending while Egypt’s political outlook remains unclear.■

Arab money

Barclays Egypt announced its first quarter financial results, with its profits after taxes growing to LE71 million, a 78 percent in-crease from the same period in 2012.

“The largest contributor to our improved profitability is growth of 20 percent on net interest income and fees versus the prior year, in addition to lower impairment charges which dropped to EGP 27.8 mil-lion, 62 percent lower than last year,” said Soha al-Tuky, Barclays Egypt finance director.■

Barclays alright

12 Focus File28 June 2012

,The changing of the guard

Mubarak’spowers were governed by the 1971 Constitution and its amendments in 1980, 2005 and 2007

■ Sworn into office in front of Parliament■ Commander of the armed forces■ Could declare war with parliamentary approval■ In instances that threaten national unity, could take measures to confront risk after soliciting prime minister and speakers of the People’s Assembly and the Shura Council■ Could issue legislation with parliamentary approval■ Could apoint prime minister and his depu-ties, ministers and their deputies, and relieve them of their duties■ Cabinet and Parliament approved overall policy of the state, the public plan of eco-nomic and social development, and the overall budget■ Could dissolve Parliament if necessary■ Could request amendment of constitutional articles■ Period in office: six-year terms, unlimited re-elections■ Has the right to “promulgate or veto laws”■ Could conclude treaties but any treaties that affected the state had to have parliamentary approval■ Could announce a state of emergency with parliamentary approval

The role of the president will be very limited compared to what we had before. [Former President Hosni] Mubarak had all imaginable powers — the right to life and death — he owned everything. You cannot compare Mubarak to any other president, not even [Spanish General Francisco] Franco. Former President Gamal Ab-del Nasser had no powers; he was limited by the army and its head, Mohamed Abdel Hakim Amer. He had no control over the army until 1967.

I expect the president to be re-elected after the constitution is passed, because there will also be new parliamentary elections. The state of emergency is still in the power of the president and the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces and the president can execute this power, but not declare war. This has to be done in agreement with the SCAF.

Eventually, the president will have the power to imple-ment his policies, but he will not have excessive powers. He will not be able to declare war

because this is an intermediary situation. He will not be presi-dent of the police or the judi-ciary, or chairman of the High Council of Police, but he will be able to appoint the interior minister. He will also not have the right to appoint the head of the Court of Cassation or the Supreme Constitutional Court. This power will be taken from him and given to the judges. Mubarak had those powers, but this will be finished. Morsy will definitely have the right to dis-solve Parliament. ■

Hossam Eissa, legal expert and professor at Ain Shams University: Nothing compares to the past

The biggest problem right now is the powers of the president. He is constrained by the 2011 Consti-tutional Declaration and the June 2012 addendum. The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has given itself the right to interfere in the constitution-writing process, meaning that the military will not withdraw from political life imme-diately. It will be a gradual process.

The president can only declare war with SCAF’s approval. This is not right; the declaration of war should be under the jurisdiction of the president with parliamen-tary approval. If the president is from the [Muslim Brotherhood’s] Freedom and Justice Party and Parliament is also dominated by the FJP, then the relationship will be smooth. It will allow the presi-dent to apply his platform. This is similar to President Barack Obama in the US, who is a Democrat and came to power as the Democrats were the majority in the Senate.

In any case, the FJP will not hold

a majority in the next round of par-liamentary elections. It will prob-ably get one-third or a maximum of 35 percent of the vote. It achieved 42 percent with all the campaign-ing and after years of being op-pressed under former President Hosni Mubarak. But with events over the past five months and its performance in Parliament, this will decrease.

The president has the right to ask for a state of emergency with parlia-mentary approval for a maximum of six months, and then it needs to go to a referendum.

Everything is centered around the personality of the president. This is the main criterion. I don’t think any minister or entity can be in opposition to the decisions of the president. It is not logical. These are employees of the presi-dent. Opposition will come from other political forces but not gov-ernment institutions. The army it-self will draw back in time against the powers of the president.■

Youssef Auf, judge from Giza Preliminary Court: Limited powers

Youssef Auf

Hossam Eissa

By Nadine Marroushi

After a 30-year legacy of extensive power appropriation by the country’s former regime, the new and first civilian president in Egypt is ushering in what has commonly been called the second republic. But with this second republic, the office of the presidency is chang-ing, both in terms of power and authority. Egypt Independent spoke to legal experts and political analysts to get their opinions.

13Focus File28 June 2012

,The changing of the guard

Morsy’s

powers as president are gov-erned by the March 2011 Con-stitutional Declaration and its amendment on 17 June

■ Sworn into office in front of the Supreme Constitutional Court■ Not commander of the armed forces■ Needs SCAF approval to declare war■ Can appoint prime minister and his depu-ties, as well as ministers and their deputies, and relieve them from their duties■ Can announce a state of emergency■ Can commission the armed forces to provide domestic security; needs SCAF approval■ No legislative authority or ability to dissolve parliament■ Cabinet must work with SCAF to issue public policy for the state and public budget, and en-sure its implementation■ If he finds the new constitution contains an article that conflicts with the revolution’s goals and main principles, or with any principle agreed upon in former constitutions, he can request that the Constituent Assembly revise this specific article within 15 days■ Period permitted in office: two four-year terms■ Must appoint a vice president■ The right to “promulgate laws or object to them”■ Can represent the state domestically and abroad, sign international treaties and agree-ments, and be considered a part of the legal system of the state

We definitely need to distin-guish between the powers of the president before a new constitution is written, and after it is completed. The sup-plement to the Constitutional Declaration [passed by the rul-ing military council] puts some restrictions on the powers of the president and places him in a position that is structurally similar to that of former Egyp-tian prime ministers. Egyptian laws previously gave the presi-dent a lot of authority, because this is a presidential country.

The coming few months will witness a power struggle

between the Muslim Brother-hood and the Supreme Coun-cil of the Armed Forces, and both will use their respective assets. The Brotherhood has re-discovered the street and is us-ing revolutionary slogans. The SCAF has legislative authority and veto power over the Con-stituent Assembly.

What we’re witnessing is very similar to transitions that other regions, such as Eastern Eu-rope and Latin America, have experienced. It’s quite normal. Under a new constitution, we will have a semi-presidential system with fewer powers for

the president. His legislative powers will be undermined by Parliament, so we won’t have presidential decrees anymore. The Brotherhood wants a semi-presidential system with an empowered Parliament. Before a new constitution is written, a few ministries will remain un-der SCAF control, such as the Interior, Foreign and Finance ministries — but not under the new constitution. [The presi-dent’s] powers over the minis-tries and the judiciary will also be undermined by Parliament, as part of the semi-presidential system.■

Amr Hamzawy, former MP: Latin America-style

Ahmed Mekki, former VP of the Court of Cassation: Constitution first

Ahmed Mekki

When will we have a new constitution? We can’t talk about the president’s future powers until we have a new constitution-writing process — we’re still in a transitional phase in which the army is handing over power. We will be like the French par-liamentary system, in which the president shares execu-tive powers with the prime

minister. Morsy will have all the powers associated with the presidency. But this will happen over time, because the army is still handing over power. In theory, the presi-dent should be able to ap-point his defense minister, but do you think he will be able to remove [Supreme Council of the Armed Forces head Hussein] Tantawi?■

Amr Hamzawy

By Nadine Marroushi

After a 30-year legacy of extensive power appropriation by the country’s former regime, the new and first civilian president in Egypt is ushering in what has commonly been called the second republic. But with this second republic, the office of the presidency is chang-ing, both in terms of power and authority. Egypt Independent spoke to legal experts and political analysts to get their opinions.

14 Opinion28 June 2012

Revolutions’ formidable task By James Collins

he last few months have been a sobering experience for Egyptian revolutionar-ies. As was the case in Europe after the “Springtime of the Peoples” in 1848 —

when uprisings overturned governments in Paris, Vienna, Berlin, Milan and many smaller capitals — moderate and progressive forces quickly lost ground, unprepared for their success, lacking orga-nization and bickering among themselves. In Egypt in 2012, as in Europe in 1849, reactionary forces seem in the ascendant. The Su-preme Council of the Armed Forces and its judicial toadies have found the Muba-raks innocent of corruption, dismissed the elected Parliament and imposed its own governing “law,” soon to be revised by a kangaroo constitution-writing body.

Just as in Europe in 1848, powerful out-side forces favor the reaction. For all its promises, the G-8 has done virtually noth-ing, a fact tacitly admitted in May 2012 by US Undersecretary of State Robert Hormats, in remarks designed to excuse Western foot-dragging on the Deauville partnership with Arab Countries in tran-sition. In Egypt, the US has gotten what it wanted: excluding from power the Muba-rak boys, whom the US believed had little support within the military, but keeping the military in control. Any doubts about US policy have been removed by the tut-tutting about the outrageous behavior of the SCAF. The irrefutable evidence of naked American support for tyranny in Egypt will be approval of the Interna-tional Monetary Fund’s US$3.2 billion loan to Egypt, which cannot be justified on economic grounds.

Before getting too discouraged about this turn of events, let’s consider the les-sons of 1848. Overthrowing Mubarak, like overthrowing Louis-Philippe I of France in February 1848, was the easy part. Destroying an entrenched elite — Mubarakism — will be a much

more formidable and time-consuming task. Youth-ful demonstrators in Vienna in 1848 twice drove Emperor Ferdinand I out of the city; after his sec-ond exile, Alfred I, Prince of Windisch-Grätzlaid laid siege to the city, killing some 3,000 people. His brother-in-law, Prince Felix zu Schwarzenberg, took over the government. He imposed martial law, re-stored censorship, closed political clubs, arrested revolutionary leaders and, two months later, forced

Ferdinand to abdicate in favor of his nephew. In March 1849, Schwarzen-berg dismissed the popularly elected Parliament, arrested its leaders and tore up the constitution they had written: He imposed his own “constitution.” In his constitution, the emperor kept ab-solute authority over the military and foreign policy, and had the right to veto any law passed in the new parliament. Sound familiar? He subsequently tried and executed several of the revolution’s leaders, perhaps personal revenge for his sister Maria’s death from a stray bul-let in Prague in June 1848.

Elsewhere in Europe in 1848–49, it was much the same story. The “Five Glorious Days” of Milan led to battle-field defeat and the restoration of Aus-trian power. The nearly bloodless fall of Louis-Philippe led to a provisional gov-ernment and a parallel revolutionary council whose leaders included Louis Blanc, Alexandre Martin (the “worker Albert”), Armand Barbes and Francois-Vincent Raspail. The elections of April 1848, like so many post-revolution elections, returned a conservative ma-jority. General Louis-Eugene Cavaig-nac’s troops killed perhaps 1,500 work-

ers during the June Days. The special tribunal sentenced Albert, Barbes and, in absentia, Blanc to deporta-

tion to the Iles Marquises in French Polynesia. Raspail, who had finished fourth in the presidential election of

1848, got five years of hard labor. Raspail, Barbes and Albert ended up in French prisons.

Successful short-term repression is a nearly inev-itable part of the revolutionary process. The good news is that it invariably fails. I am always amazed that history books tell us the revolutions of 1848 failed: not so. In cities like Milan, the Austrians would be gone within a dozen years and Italians would have their national state. In France, within a generation, a republic built on universal manhood suffrage had come to pass. Democratic reforms, workers’ rights, pensions, workers’ compensation, universal education — all of these changes came to pass in the lands of the 1848 revolutions, within one or two generations. Nationalist aspirations, in contrast, often had to wait much longer. In 1968, the violent repression of the Prague Spring stifled reform in East Central Europe. But 21 years later, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and other coun-tries overthrew their post-totalitarian regimes.

Military reaction inevitably fails because violent repression cannot solve economic problems. In June 1789, King Louis XVI of France could not shoot the revolutionaries because doing so would have cut him off from capital markets. This week, yield on Egyptian treasury bills reached a 15-year high. Egypt’s foreign currency reserves are down by half, much of the money spent on foolish at-tempts to shore up the Egyptian pound. Find-ing the Mubarak brothers innocent of corruption will surely not help Egypt’s critical capital outflow problem, nor will it reassure foreign investors that the bad old days of crony kleptocracy are over.

In the short run, Egyptian revolutionaries may be discouraged, but they should remember that implementing revolutionary change takes time. History won’t render its judgment for years to come. As for the legacy of 1848, if you find your-self in Paris, stroll along the Rue Louis Blanc, the Rue Albert, the Boulevard Barbes or the Boulevard Raspail, Paris’ longest street. Don’t waste your time looking for a Rue Cavaignac.■

James Collins is a history professor at Georgetown University

Overthrowing Mubarak, like overthrowing Louis-Philippe I of France in February 1848, was the easy part. Destroying an entrenched elite — Mubarakism will be a much more formidable and time-consuming task

Interpreting the coup By Zeinab Abul-Magd

The Egyptian case is a conspicuous example of the new generation of world coups

Union or the US, they usually installed their armed leaders as presidents — or dictators, rath-er — until they died or other coups removed them. From 1990 to today, a new generation of coups has emerged in the global scene, and recent putschists tend to stick to democracy, especially if they depend on substantial military aid from the US and need to please their pa-trons with some spectacle of free elections. New coups bring civilian presidents to power, but the armed forces reserve for themselves the upper hand in state affairs.

A coup d’etat usually takes place in a country that suffers from an economic crisis, has op-positional groups that are fragmented and not homogenous, and has a weak civil society in comparison to a strong military institution. In a unipolar global system in which the US is the only hegemonic power and benevolent patron of third-world regimes, adhering to the Ameri-can rhetoric on democracy — or the Bush Doc-trine of the 2000s — is essential to the survival of any coup. Federal law in the US prohibits granting any financial assistance “to the govern-ment of any country whose duly elected head of government is deposed by military coup or de-cree.” Thus, to hold elections and follow the path of ballot boxes becomes the only way through which coup leaders can secure the flow of US foreign aid.

The Egyptian case is a conspicuous example of the new generation of world coups. Last year, the armed putschists capitalized on the mass protests to finally get rid of Hosni Mubarak’s son Gamal, whose succession scheme threatened their economic empire and political interests. After overthrowing Mubarak, the SCAF imme-diately adopted a democratic discourse and held elections to meet the expectations of the US, which grants the Egyptian army US$1.3 billion in annual aid.

Morsy is an elected son of the coup. He is the

he newly elected president of Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mo-hamed Morsy began his national ad-dress by thanking God and the families

of the revolution’s martyrs for granting him such a victory, and immediately proceeded to deeply thank the armed forces. He saluted the Egyp-tian military and added, “Only God knows how much love I have in my heart [for it].”

There is a consensus in Egypt now that we live under military rule. Most observers believe the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces executed a military coup over the last two weeks through legal measures, and describe it as a “soft” coup that hardly relied on tanks and guns.

In February 2011, while the slogan of “The army and the people are one hand” was coined and disseminated, the SCAF established full control over the essential institutions of the state. The main pillars of a successful coup were all there: control over media, the bureaucracy, the security apparatus and the legal system.

However, the Egyptian coup seems hard to in-terpret. The intricate election of Morsy as a civil-ian president who does not belong to the coup plotters came as a surprise to many. As opposed to old-fashioned coups of the Cold War era, when the leaders of coups installed themselves as autocrats for life, the Egyptian coup allowed a civilian contestant to triumph over a fellow mili-tary candidate from the presidential race and as-sume power.

There is an interpretation for the above mys-tery. The Egyptian coup is not unique and is part of a new generation of world coup d’etats. In this latest style of coups, the military expresses sin-cere love for democracy and ballot boxes.

A recent study titled “Coups and Democracy” draws distinctions between old and new coups. During the 20th century, old-fashioned mili-tary coups were stigmatized as anti-democratic. Whether these coups were backed by the Soviet

civilian president that the military council al-lowed to rise to power, but only after issuing a supplement to the Constitutional Declaration that deprives him of any substantial authority over the armed forces. Morsy will inherit a high-ly militarized state where retired army generals and colonels occupy almost every high-ranking position in the bureaucracy and the public sec-tor. This is in addition to the fact that the mili-tary runs massive economic enterprises.

Despite the fact that the militarization of the state is a huge hurdle to any civilian president who aspires for real reform, it is significant that Morsy began his first speech by expressing his deep love for the military institution. Morsy showed no intentions during his campaign to demilitarize the state.

The US had a big role to play in pressuring the military to honor Morsy’s win. A report pub-lished by Al-Watan daily newspaper said US officials met with SCAF members to press the latter to announce the valid results of the elec-tion and accept Morsy’s victory. Before that, and over the course of many months or even years, the US had numerous talks with Muslim Broth-erhood leaders in Cairo and Washington, where the Brothers always emphasized their choice of market economy policies as well as their adher-ence to international agreements.

Even though Egypt has elected its first civilian president since its independence, it remains a bit-tersweet victory. This is not only because there is a public mistrust of the Muslim Brotherhood, but, more importantly, because Morsy’s presi-dency is characteristic of a new generation of military coups. The SCAF celebrates free elec-tions only to be allowed to tighten its grip on power while securing its indispensable Ameri-can funding.■

Zeinab Abul-Magd is a historian. She teaches at the American University in Cairo.

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15Opinion28 June 2012

Without revolutionary gear, Morsy will drown By Sherif Younis

Behaving in a revolutionary manner is difficult for a closed group that resembles a sect more than a political current, operates as an interest group rather than as a party, and fails to show trust in the public

terminds of the deal were former intelligence chief Omar Suleiman on the regime’s side and Khairat al-Shater on the Brotherhood’s. This deal has, however, faced endless obstacles.

The valor of the revolutionaries has always fended off attempts to re-create Mubarak’s re-gime, with the Brotherhood as its legitimate af-filiate. The Brotherhood ended up resorting to revolutionary legitimacy in its recent struggle after the group’s electoral bloc shrunk, as was evident in the results of the first round of the presidential election.

Nevertheless, with the presidency looming on the horizon, the Brotherhood began sending assurances to former regime figures and interest groups. Shater tried to approach business societ-ies and diverse powers that belonged to the for-mer regime, while Morsy insisted that talk about “cleansing” or overhauling the state apparatuses concerns only a few hundred individuals, and that relations with remaining members of the formerly ruling National Democratic Party and regime networks are not characterized as hostile to the post-revolution political order.

On the one hand, it remains unclear who among the former regime figures will be picked for cleansing, making this a daunting task be-cause the ruling military council has not decid-

he political scene suggests the Broth-erhood has achieved a crushing vic-tory after President-elect Mohamed Morsy took the lead in the first round

of the vote and eventually won in the runoff. Even though the Brotherhood has tried to pres-ent Morsy as the revolution’s candidate, I will show how the group’s conservatism will stand in the way of its candidate’s ability to challenge the pillars of former President Hosni Mubarak’s police state.

In the run-up to the runoff, a large bloc of Brotherhood supporters took to the streets to combat the military institution’s desire to dominate the constitution-writing process. In a deft maneuver, the Brotherhood changed its discourse without making any concessions to other revolutionary groups. It raised the mot-tos and demands of the revolution both in the group’s electoral address and in street protests. The Brotherhood echoed the people’s demands for ending military rule and trying the killers of the protesters. This turnaround goes against the line the Brotherhood adopted at the start of the revolution and until very recently.

The Brotherhood’s policy initially centered around negotiations with the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces while yielding pressure on it by exploiting the revolution — which they sold out on when they did not participate in the protests that broke out last year on Mohamed Mahmoud Street, at the Cabinet of Ministers building and at the Maspero state TV building. When the Brotherhood heaped pressure on the military, the group did so as part of a coalition with Salafis and under the banner of Islamist mottos.

The conservative leadership, which tipped slightly toward the revolution, will soon find itself torn between its pro-revolution crowd of supporters and the Brotherhood’s con-servative, pro-stability core. This leaves the Brotherhood trapped between two bitter choices: first, confrontation with the military, which the group cannot handle because of the lack of an ideological frame of reference and a wide alliance with other powers that is essential for such a confrontation; and second, a possible understanding with the state security apparatus and other institutions — which would be very challenging, as will be discussed later.

Since the outburst of the 25 January uprising, the regime called on the Brotherhood to accept a deal to end its outlawed status and operate openly as a “legitimate” political force, which was an attempt to abort the revolution. The mas-

By Issandr El Amranigypt has just lived through a period of high anxiety, unexpected political twists and turns, and an ongoing constitutional coup by the military that may or may not

be reversed by the new president and other po-litical forces. And this has come after 16 months of post-Hosni Mubarak transition that has — at best — been halting, confusing, ill-managed and badly planned.

While Mohamed Morsy’s election may now calm things, time is short to resolve many out-standing issues sprung by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces with its 17 June supplement to the Constitutional Declaration, and to get the government back to the business of actual gov-erning rather than transitioning.

The events surrounding the presidential elec-tion have highlighted the fragility of relations between the military and political forces, and left many questions unanswered; notably what role the military will have in governing and how the future constitution will be written. There is an urgent need for answers, since Egypt could very well face more political crises in the future as the balance of power between the military and various political forces stabilizes, or, if the lack of consensus on both issues of process (how to car-ry out the remainder of the transition) and sub-stance (new laws and policies to address pressing problems) continues.

Take a step back from the political front lines and look at the situation Egypt finds itself in. The January 2011 uprising delivered a major shock to the country’s economy, with a recovery still pend-ing, and growth (and thus job creation) quite anemic. The greatest obstacle to the recovery remains political uncertainty. This uncertainty has not only disillusioned part of the population with revolutionary politics. Unfortunately, as the presidential election campaigns showed, politi-cians are continuing to make false or irrespon-sible promises — from forgiving the debts of cer-tain professions, such as taxi drivers, to repeating the myth that billions of dollars allegedly stolen by the former regime can be easily recovered and will solve the budget deficit and economic crisis.

This is why a government mixing competent technocrats and politicians must be formed as soon as possible. The Muslim Brotherhood has been right to criticize the performance of the Ka-mal al-Ganzouri Cabinet but has yet to honestly address the issues ahead. Its first task should be to be transparent with the state of the economy and state finances, something no Cabinet could do under the Mubarak regime, and tell the Egyptian people the truth about the difficult times ahead, namely that things will get worse before getting better.

There is also the question of prioritizing. The Islamists’ championing of a new law regulating

Islamic finance is not a bad thing, and may attract new investment from Gulf states and elsewhere. But it hardly goes to the core of the immediate problems facing Egypt — ones as basic as the availability of fuel and subsidized bread. This is why it is a little odd that it is the first piece of economic legislation the Freedom and Justice Party intended to pass before Parliament’s recent dissolution. Likewise, the FJP shares responsibil-ity with the Ganzouri Cabinet and the SCAF for the delays in inking a deal with the International Monetary Fund, the key event other lenders and donors, as well as private investors, are waiting for. And they have been notably silent on the question of whether the Egyptian pound should be devalued — something most economic ana-lysts believe is inevitable at this point.

Finally, it is also crucial to remove the ongoing ambiguity about who governs Egypt. After 16 months, Egypt had an elected Parliament (that was just disbanded) and now has an elected presi-dent. SCAF’s new constitutional supplement is not just unacceptable because it is an undemo-cratic imposition, but perhaps even more so be-cause it adds to the uncertainty over the most basic question the outside world is asking about the country: Who is in charge?■

Issandr El Amrani is a writer on Middle East-ern affairs. He blogs at www.arabist.net.

The SCAF’s new constitutional supplement adds to the uncertainty over the most basic question the outside world is asking about the country: Who is in charge?

ed to sacrifice such figures — at least not yet. On the other hand, the Brotherhood cannot assume power comfortably by merely giving reassuranc-es to these groups — after purging them of cor-ruption, that is — because there are no organic bonds linking them together.

Infiltration of state institutions is another area that poses a challenge to the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood’s experience in permeating profes-sional syndicates is a different story because the Islamist wave had hegemonized universities for a long time, which eventually paved the way for the Brotherhood to control syndicates. This sce-nario, however, is unlikely to be repeated at the state level.

More importantly, the Brotherhood will not be left to fully control the executive authority. The web of interests that permeates all state ap-paratuses will not be reformed, even if slightly or slowly, without confrontation. Each confronta-tion requires an ability to bear the reactions ex-pected on the part of those power centers, which are linked to security bodies. It is also worth not-ing that all parties linked to the former regime are armed with state secrets that they can leak out if they feel threatened.

Let us not forget that the police state is found-ed on closing the political sphere. Even though security bodies have been trained to work in a slightly open sphere since 2004 and more so during the revolution, and even though they have shown reasonable skill, this is unlikely to have changed their concepts on security. All of their movements were intended to devastate the political sphere by frustrating the people and committing crimes against protesters and peo-ple in general. Therefore, agreement between the Brotherhood and the security apparatus is unlikely to take place, since the police state re-mains wary of the Islamist group.

While reconciliation seems logical and easy as an abstract idea, on the ground it requires a revolutionary power that is able to combine a powerful political discourse with public trust to respond to corrupt bodies through popular mobilization.

Even though the Brotherhood has raised the slogans of the revolution, behaving in a revo-lutionary manner is difficult for a closed group that resembles a sect more than a political cur-rent, operates as an interest group rather than as a party, and fails to show trust in the public.■

Sherif Younis is a lecturer of Egyptian and

European modern history at Helwan University, and a professional translator.

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ETime: A luxury Egypt can no longer afford

16 Environment28 June 2012

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erinary Services, announced that Egypt imported 30,000 tons of meat from Brazil, India, Australia, Para-guay, Argentina and Canada in May, in preparation for the holy month of Ramadan, and in keeping with state policy to reduce meat prices.

As demand for affordable beef gathers momentum in Egypt, the government has come up with a quick fix to the problem by negoti-ating a new long-term deal involving Sudan exporting more than 50,000 cattle in its first year.

Sudan had already exported meat and cattle to Egypt in May, in accor-dance with an agreement between the two countries’ agriculture min-istries.

Secretary General of the Suda-nese Livestock and Meat Exporters Federation Siddig Haddoub said the deal is expected to generate large revenues for Sudan, and develop its national economy.

While Sudanese meat exports had been restricted in the past on qual-ity grounds, Dr. Salim said a team of veterinarians was sent to inspect the live animals before slaughter to ensure they met Egyptian standards and were free from all contagious diseases and epidemics, before ship-ment to Egyptian ports.

Traditionally, Sudanese beef has not successfully penetrated the Egyptian market the way camel meat has. Egypt has imported large quantities of Sudanese camel meat for consumption.

Egyptians are enthusiastic meat-

eaters in general, although there is no dedicated study on their meat-eating patterns. A poll published in 2010 by the Information and Deci-sion Support Center of the Egyptian Cabinet revealed that the consump-tion of red meat was increasing dra-matically.

The study showed that 11 percent of Egypt’s 80 million citizens eat an average of less than 2 kg of meat a month throughout the year, includ-ing the slaughter of animals during the Eid holiday.

It also provided stark statistics on meat consumption in the country, reporting that 32 percent of the pop-ulation consume between 2 and 4 kg of meat on average per month; 30 percent eat 4 to 6 kg; 8 percent con-sume 6 to 8 kg; 6 percent consume between 8 and 10 kg while 7 percent of Egyptians eat more than 10 kg of meat per month.

However, a 2008 study by the US Department of Agriculture’s annual Livestock and Product Report on Egypt stated that the average per capita consumption of red meat is estimated at 8.5 kg per year, relative-ly low compared to consumption levels in other countries.

This low consumption is due main-ly to the limited local production combined with low income. Accord-ingly, meat consumption is expected to decline further after the short sup-ply of locally-produced meat drove prices up.

Nadia Safwat, a state employee, told Egypt Independent that the

rising prices have taken a toll on Ra-madan preparations. Instead of get-ting ready to reflect on the spiritual significance of the blessed month, families now have to think creatively on how to use their budgets in the best way.

“There is a severe trust crisis be-tween citizens and officials. It grew even worse after the revolution; there is vagueness surrounding the actual situation of foot-and-mouth vaccinations and if the disease slowed down or not.”

In a spontaneous conversation with a cab driver about the soaring prices, he admitted joyfully that he did not have to worry about meat anymore, since his youngest daugh-ter had just got married to one of Dar al-Salam’s most renowned butchers.

“Worrying about meat prices for me is history. Now I get a good meat dinner three times a week,” he said, chuckling. He added that he only needed to open a grocery store to become truly self-sufficient.

However, many more people are being counted out of the meat game this year as beef prices hit LE80 per kg, driving poultry prices to rise exponentially by an average of 10.5 percent between February and March to reach LE19 per kg. The cost of fresh fish also climbed 13.5 percent month-on-month to reach LE16.7 per kg in March, accord-ing to the new study by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics.

Mohamed Khaled, a professor

of meat hygiene, told Egypt Inde-pendent that the ongoing crisis is mainly due to corruption and mis-management, which makes it hard, if not impossible, to get out of this vicious circle.

“The government left a very im-portant topic such as Egyptian na-tional food security in the hands of executive bodies instead of having strategic long-term plans to increase local production and its quality,” Khaled says.

Khaled points out that the prob-lem is bigger than just rising prices, because people are also suspicious about the meat they eat.

“Every couple of months we hear about infected meat being seized. People are angry at the recurring meat crises, especially when infected meat has been sold causing widespread diseases, including the case we all re-member of Indian meat infected with Sarcocystis worms in 2010.”

Just two weeks ago, the General Department of Food Supply Investi-gation Police seized 850 kg of meat of unknown origin, unfit for human consumption, in Giza.

According to investigations, the butcher had collected rotten meat from animal fat and other discarded animal parts, packaging it in bags and selling it on the market as imported meat. A veterinary report confirmed the meat was unfit for human con-sumption.

As a proactive step, some traders belonging to Salafi groups and the Muslim Brotherhood have put up large tents in slum areas, where they sell meat at low prices, ranging from LE20 to LE35.

However, Dr. Suad al-Kholi, the head of the Directorate of Veterinary Medicine in Cairo, warned against these unlicensed tents, emphasiz-ing that the meat being sold did not come from government slaughter-houses and had not undergone any government inspections.

The complaints are not a new phe-nomenon. Egyptians have always objected to high meat prices. During mass protests under former Presi-dent Anwar Sadat’s rule, people also protested the increase in meat pric-es, shouting that the price of meat had reached LE1.■

A Meaty businessAs Ramadan approaches, demand for meat increases

By Raghda Mohamed

lightly less than one month away, the holy breezes of Ramadan already pervade Egypt’s polluted air. But,

just as Ramadan lanterns light up, worries over Egyptian households’ Ramadan budgets seem to rise even higher.

In a month that is intended to have more spirituality and less consump-tion, meat — and lots of it — is still an inevitable guest at Egyptian iftar tables. The soaring price of meat is becoming a real worry for Egyptians who will have to choose between cutting meat from their Ramadan diet, or spending a lot of money to purchase it.

A recent study by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics showed that Egyptians are facing one of the worst months in recent years for steadily increasing prices of meat, poultry and fish, with a rise of over 10 percent.

Figures that were published by the country’s statistics agency indicate that many new factors this year con-tributed to an already difficult situa-tion; in particular, the wide outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease, which has claimed the lives of thousands of cattle across the country.

Since its detection earlier this year, the disease has infected between 70,000 and 100,000 cattle, kill-ing more than 10,000 and putting Egypt’s livestock at risk.

Haytham Mohamed, the deputy head of the butchers’ branch at the Cairo Chamber of Commerce pre-dicts another sharp increase in meat prices as Ramadan approaches, as well as increases in poultry and fish prices.

Mohamed told Egypt Indepen-dent that the high prices are due to shortages in the local supply of red meat, as Cairo slaughterhouses re-ceived less cattle from governorates surrounding the capital than usual because of the foot-and-mouth out-break. There are also import limits on both frozen meat and livestock since recent measures have extended customs’ exemptions on imported meat by a few extra days, contribut-ing to the shortages.

In the wake of the foot-and-mouth epidemic, the butchers branch of the Cairo Chamber of Commerce criticized the decision issued by the Agriculture Ministry, which banned the inter-governorate transportation of cattle in a bid to curb the infection rate. The chamber argued that such a step would lead to price hikes, particularly in Cairo, which relies heavily on livestock purchases from neighboring governorates.

The meat industry in Egypt has become a chronic problem. Increas-ingly high prices and lower supply, as well as a failure to create a long-term plan to maintain an adequate supply of local beef, are among the main contributors to the growing crisis.

For decades, the government used two main sources of meat. Two-thirds was domestically produced every year while a third was im-ported to make up the difference be-tween local production of 700,000 tons and consumers’ yearly demand of 1,200,000 tons.

However, this year, the Egyptian government is looking for new so-lutions to meet the ever-increasing demand. Dr. Osama Salim, head of the General Authority for Vet-

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The ongoing crisis is mainly due to corruption and mismanagement, which makes it hard, if not impossible, to get out of this vicious circle

17Science & Technology28 June 2012

Tapped outAfter the latest contamination scandal, can you trust your water?

By Louise SarantIt is a common perception world-wide that drinking bo�led water is safer than consuming tap water. In Egypt speci�cally, people have li�le faith in the safety of the water that runs from the tap, in light of the country’s exceedingly high lev-el of kidney failure — a condition spurred by the lack of a reliable source for clean drinking water.

Although the health bene�ts claimed by the labels on bo�led water are unproven at best, most Egyptians consider tap water con-taminated and unhealthy.

Bo�led water consumption has been steadily growing in the world over the past three decades, and has become one of the most dy-namic sectors of the food and bev-erage industry. In Egypt, the stable price of bo�led water has made the market grow considerably, al-though it is estimated that bo�led water costs 1,000 times more than tap water by volume.

But the so-called “healthy” label for bo�led water received a serious blow in Egypt a week ago, when seven brands of local bo�led water were taken o� the market overnight a�er tests revealed the presence of pollutants.

�e incriminated wells were shut down immediately, with the World Health Organization (WHO) is-suing a statement naming the con-taminated brands. Alfa, Alhadeer, Sawa, Aqua Delta, Taiba, Aqua Mina and Aqua Soteir did not pass the Ministry of Health’s surprise well-water testing.

Ahmed Shaaban is a professor of Water Pollution Research, and vice-president of the National Re-search Centre (NRC). He explains that the Ministry of Health and other authorized institutes — in-cluding the NRC — regularly con-duct testing of bo�led water on the market and pay surprise visits to bo�led water companies to analyze the water quality of their wells.

�is time, these seven companies failed the test a�er the water tested positive for live protozoa, usually present only in the intestines and feces of humans and animals, says Shaaban.

�ere is only one likely scenario that explains the presence of this parasite in the bo�led water: the surface water of the wells mixed with polluted waste water near the plant from septic tanks, or dis-charges into the groundwater. “�e problem is that these companies use shallow wells, which are between 50 and 300 meters deep only, when the pure and clean water is located much deeper,” says Shaaban.

�e location of the bo�led water companies has a major in�uence on the quality of the water, and if dumpsites are located around the wells, the water will be con-taminated, he explains. “�ere are always methods to get rid of all

pollutants, no ma�er how contam-inated the water is,” he adds. “Once the water’s composition is evalu-ated, we decide on the most ap-propriate type of treatment. If the water contains too many minerals then we opt for reverse osmosis, a membrane-technology �ltration system that removes many of the large molecules and ions from the water.” If the problem resides in the presence of bacteria and organic ma�er, the preferred technique used is carbon �ltering, which uses activated carbon to remove con-taminants and impurities.

“I am positive that the wells that have been shut down by the minis-try will be reopened in a couple of weeks,” claims Shaaban, because no ma�er how contaminated well-wa-ter can be, �ltering techniques can get rid of most of it, and the water can then comply with the health and safety standards set by WHO. “For these wells, what needs to be done is to either change the puri-�cation method or clean the �lters because maintenance practices are not being followed.”

While most contaminants in bo�led water in�ltrate the solution at the source, before it is bo�led up and put on the market, picking the wrong storage facility can also be highly detrimental to the quality of the water. If, for example, bo�les are stored outside under a plastic

c o v e r , the sun can cause the poly-mers in the plas-tic to melt and mix with the water. “Not only is this very un-healthy, but it also changes the taste of the water,” says Shaaban.

According to a study conducted by the Egypt Public Health Association in 2008, “Quality of Bo�led Water Brands in Egypt, Bio-logical Water Examination,” the longer the time between the production date and the date of purchasing, the higher the likelihood of unacceptable samples becomes.

Although unopened bo�les of water should have a shelf life of 30 days, most bo�led water stickers advertise a shelf life of one to two years. If refrigerated, the risks are con-siderably lower, but if le� at room temperature for over a month, the study reveals that 52 percent of un-refrigerated bo�les fail to comply with Egyptian standards, a pa�ern consistent in all brands, according to the study.

“�ere was a major outbreak of diseases related to contaminated

terborne diseases.In Egypt’s most rural areas, there

are no proper treatment and secure sewage systems, and this has two severe consequences. If a bo�led water company is located nearby, there is a high risk that the ground-water will be contaminated with waste and sewage water. It also means that drinking tap water here is very risky. “�e risks related to tap water are high in rural Egypt,” asserts Shaaban, “because a large amount of disinfectant is added into the water to try to purify it, which is very unhealthy. But the safety of tap water is guaranteed in all of Egypt’s major cities,” he says.

As a water pollution research pro-fessor, Shaaban and two colleagues from the UK and Greece are now working on a new project to design cheaper water cleaning technology speci�cally for rural areas.

�e system, “Bioremoval for Clean Water,” is speci�cally de-signed to remove the iron, manga-nese and organic ma�er that are found in Egyptian aquifers.

“A�er a few years of research, we discovered that one bacteria in par-ticular can eliminate iron and man-ganese particles by feeding on the organic ma�er,” says Shaaban. �e scientist won’t reveal the name of this bacteria as the Egyptian strain of the bacteria is currently being patented.

“We a�ached the bacteria on a special type of gravel that acts as a bio�lter inside the water treatment system, and reduces the level of iron and manganese to acceptable levels,” he explains.

Although Shaaban has received funding from the Ministry of Scien-ti�c Research for the research part of the project, he is still waiting for additional funding to implement this device in rural areas. Given the current political climate, however, nothing is for certain.■

Bacterial growth �om contaminated water

I am positive that the wells that have been shut down by the ministry will be reopened in a couple of weeks

There is only one likely scenario thatexplains the presence of this parasite in the bottled water: the surface water of the wells mixed with polluted waste water

bo�led water in Egypt in the 1980s,” Shaaban remembers. “�e well water of a company in Shar-qiya was polluted with bacteria and parasites, and the Ministry of Health closed the company down for good.” In 1994, an outbreak of cholera in the United States was associated with bo�led water. �e incriminated company obtained the water mainly from municipal water and some of the wells tested positive for fecal coliform bacteria. In Portugal in the 1970s, cholera spread due to the use of bo�led water originating from a limestone aquifer that had been contaminat-ed by broken sewers nearby. �ese examples show how contaminated bo�led water can easily spread wa-

18 Culture28 June 2012

By Helen Stuhr-Rommereimhere is a lot of art on the In-ternet. Most newly created art, no matter who makes it or where it is, will eventu-

ally find itself reproduced and rep-resented in digital space — a docu-ment of an object that exists in the real world.

But artist and musician Kareem Lotfy is interested in this evidence as something more, as the thing itself. “I always saw online documentations more than real shows,” Lotfy says.

And when online documentation is so much more present than the physical spaces and objects being documented, the real things begin to fade into irrelevancy. The question arises of why what an image repre-sents is more important than the im-age itself, as it exists online.

“You start developing senses to-ward the perception of things on a screen. You start loving seeing it through this light and pixels and texts around it,” Lotfy says.

This appreciation for the aesthetics of the digital environment informs not simply the work Lotfy creates, but also how he presents it online. Many young artists today use the In-ternet as a calling card, creating web-sites to clearly showcase their work.

But Lotfy’s online self-representation is more diffuse. Rather than fighting the scatterbrained, visual over-stimula-tion of digital space, he embraces it and allows his work to swim in it.

Lotfy produces both images and music prolifically, but on his Tum-blr page, you will find his work dis-persed among other found images and sounds. His website changes regularly, but presents only one im-age or video at a time, sometimes his work and sometimes the work of someone else. He encounters the Internet as space and material, and mixes his artwork into this space, allowing it to constantly shift and disappear — to be absorbed into the ephemeral, changeable pixels and bits that compose it.

Lotfy studied sculpture at the Al-exandria University Faculty of Fine Arts, and although he may have mostly left physical objects behind, he approaches digital space with a sculptor’s sensitivity. He is still in-terested in shaping material, but the nature of that material has changed.

The images he creates tangle the lines between reality and the repre-sentation of reality. This relationship is exemplified in an image Lotfy cre-ated a year ago: a simple line draw-ing, suspended in a gallery, casting shadows on a wall, hanging as an almost-presence in an almost-real space.

The image was created by scan-ning and editing a bamboo-and-ink drawing. When encountered online, it becomes documentation of an im-possible work of art. There is no way

Rather than fighting the scatterbrained, visual over-stimulation of digital space, he embraces it and allows his work to swim in it

to know whether it is an illusion, a Photoshop creation, or something “real.” As the boundary between im-age and document fades, the distinc-tion itself becomes unimportant.

This play with imagined installa-tion images and virtual exhibitions is integral to the way Lotfy shows his work. Although he lives in Cairo, Lotfy is as likely to exhibit in Switzer-land or the Netherlands as in Egypt. After a residency in Amsterdam in 2010, he met a group of artists who shared his interests and with whom it was as easy to interact and collabo-rate via the Internet as in real life.

Most of these artists are based in Europe, and since 2010, several have gone on to create actual small gal-leries to show artwork. But Lotfy remains here, and he remains online. “I still exist in the air, as this guy in Egypt,” he says.

His most recent exhibition, “Tribal House,” which opened in late May at Headquarters in Zurich, Switzerland, plays with this relationship and em-phasizes his abstract presence as an artist from a distant, exotic location,

while turning all sense of space and object, digital or real, on its head.

Headquarters is a small gallery showcasing work that merges physi-cal and virtual space. Appropriately, the work that eventually became “Tribal House” went through mul-tiple processes of translation from ob-ject to image to object and back again. It began with Lotfy shaping small, African-influenced, generically tribal masks out of clay. The creations came, according to Lotfy, from a reticent impulse toward traditional sculpture left over from his days in the Faculty of Fine Arts.

Lotfy photographed the masks and edited the digital images so that the photographed objects appeared as 3-D simulations. He began mak-

ing images, placing the digital masks in living rooms and bathrooms and gardens so that they hang as strange, looming non-presences, awkwardly filling up mundane spaces.

For the Headquarters exhibition, Lotfy simply sent the images to his friends at the gallery. They printed them out and pasted them on to large wooden panels, then placed them in various settings around the space.

In photographs, the resulting exhi-bition appears no more real than the digital images Lotfy originally cre-ated. The masks hover uncomfort-ably, appearing too large and too flat to be real, creating the illusion of an illusion.

Although the exhibition actually took place, it nonetheless exists as

comfortably online as offline. For Lotfy, who did not go to Switzerland to see the installed work, and for most people who will encounter it, the exhibition itself becomes simply an elaborate act of image creation.

But for all of Lotfy’s manic explo-ration of the visual, virtual space, and all of the tricks and illusions his work engages in, there is an aspect of his artistic interest that is purely sensual, based on beautiful textures, images and sounds.

Engaging as he does in a hyper-active intake of digital media of all kinds, Lotfy suffers from the all-too-common 21st-century affliction of image fatigue. “There are too many visuals, and people deal with it as an information tool,” he says.

Both in his work as a visual art-ist and a musician, Lotfy attempts to find the sensual essence of im-age and sound. His music, which he performed recently in Cairo at the 100 Live Music Festival and which is accessible online, displays a deep appreciation for the resonances of the physical world — saxophones, drums hit with human hands, echoes, bird sounds and buzzing strings. Lotfy weaves together all these sounds, combining them with digital rhythms and textures to create short pieces that come together and disappear like momentary pictures. There is no question of whether the music is there. As Lotfy points out, it is simply not actually there, and the question of representation or reality never comes up.

This sensitivity to specific media is also expressed in Lotfy’s visual art. Amid all his other work, over the past year he has been creating digi-tal tapestries: undulating black-and-white GIFs based on patterns from real woven fabrics. In December, Lotfy exhibited a number of these shimmering blankets of pixels as part of the “d1sc0nN3ct” exhibition at Townhouse Gallery of contempo-rary art.

Again, the installation of the work engaged in a complicated transla-tion of the digital into the physical. But in this case, rather than playing perceptual games, the patterns pro-jected on the Townhouse factory wall appeared simply as shimmering, textural objects — no longer images not meant to reside in virtual reality or physical reality alone, but simply pure expressions of the aesthetic possibilities of digital material.■

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fyCritic’s pickIn a noisy online world, ‘Quiet Chatrooms’ is a reprieve

Living in a digital worldFor Kareem Lotfy, lines between reality and representation become blurred

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Kareem Lotfy’s works of art are made to ultimately find their home online In “Tribal House,” Lotfy plays on the idea of the exotic artist

By Ania Szremski

ife in big cities is stressful. My nonstop perusal of the Internet, with its constant onslaught of urgent emails

and Twitter updates, is also stress-ful. And the perpetually bad news I read about all day is probably the most stressful of all.

But in some corners of the Inter-net, there are unexpected oases of calm. Sarah Samy’s “Quiet Chat-rooms” is one of those. The artist, a student currently enrolled both at Alexandria University’s Faculty of Engineering and the independent art program of MASS Alexandria, has been making a name for herself over the past two years as one of the more interesting net/glitch/new media artists around.

“Quiet Chatrooms” was commis-sioned by the online-only Fach & Asendorf Gallery, a Tumblr-like vir-tual white cube space that presents a regularly updated program of new

projects. It’s sort of like a solo show in your browser. The best thing about the format is that the previous shows are always still up, so you can keep going back and revisiting your favorite works.

That brings us back to Samy’s proj-ect, online now for a few months. It is a colored geometric universe of textured and shaded facets that shift, spin, enfold and reconstitute them-selves as you click your mouse, slow and gently or dizzyingly fast. Calling up metaphors of a sublime Internet-as-ocean, the seemingly aquatic room — which is at the same time infinitely deep and infinitely repeti-

tive — shifts shape to the soothing sound of wind chimes, the plaintive wails of what might be dolphins, and an eerie, organic purring.

The overall effect is strangely soothing, if not hypnotic, and deeply addictive. After getting too engrossed in all the rapid-fire, sexy, violent and sensational stimulation that the Internet so easily seduces us with, “Quiet Chatrooms” is a welcome reprieve to get lost in for a while.■

View Sarah Samy’s “Quiet Chat-rooms” at fa-g.org/special/sarahsamy-quietchatrooms/

Find the latestEgypt Independent

issue here

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19Culture28 June 2012

Quiz: Are you an Arab literary prize whiz? By M. Lynx Qualey

he landscape of Arabic literary prizes is changing: �e last �ve years have seen

an explosion of big-money prizes such as the “Arabic Booker,” the Etisalat Prize, and the Tayeb Salih award. It has also seen the collapse of some regime-a�liated awards,

such as the Muammar Qadha� and Saddam Hussein prizes. How well do you know the good, the bad, and the gossip about Arab and Arabic literary prizes?

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Let’s start in October 1988, when there were

far fewer prizes for Arabic literature. �at is the year when Naguib Mahfouz became the �rst (and so far the only) Arab writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. Of the following, who was NOT on the Nobel’s shortlist of Arab writers that year?

a. Yusuf Idrisb. Tayeb Salihc. Adonisd. Bahaa Taher

In the 1990s and early 2000s, many of the big

Arab literary prizes were associated with corrupt leaders. Which Egyptian author famously turned down the 2003 Arab Novel Award, saying that the Egyptian government did “not possess the credibility to grant it”?

a. Gamal al-Ghitanib. Ibrahim Aslanc. Sonallah Ibrahimd. Hamdi Abu Golayyel

Eight years later, in 1996, the American

University in Cairo estab-lished a literary prize in Mah-fouz’s name. The prize would recognize an Arabic book of mer-it every 11 December, Mahfouz’s birthday. All of the following are true of the Mahfouz prize, but what makes it UNIQUE in the world of Arab literary prizes?

a. A large percentage of the winners have been Egyptiansb. �e prize has been awarded to virtually the same number of men (nine) and women (eight)c. �e prize has been given to two winners in a “tie”d. �e prize has been given to a Palestinian novelist

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Which now-deposed leader did NOT have a

major literary prize named a�er him?

a. Muammar Qadha� b. Hosni Mubarak c. Saddam Hussein d. Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali

Since 2005, a number of large prizes have been

created. �e �rst Sawiris awards were given out in 2005; the �rst Sheikh Zayed Book Awards in 2007; the �rst International Prize for Arabic Fiction (“Arabic Book-er”) was awarded in 2008; and the �rst Etisalat Prize for Arabic Children’s Literature was awarded in 2009. Which one prize awards the MOST for a single book, the equivalent of LE1.6 million?

a. Sawiris Prizeb. Sheikh Zayed Book Awardc. “Arabic Booker”d. Etisalat Prize for Arabic Chil-dren’s Literature

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What was DIFFERENT about the “Arabic Booker”

that some established Egyptian writers did not like?

a. Each year, a non-Arab “specialist” sits on the juryb. �e prize money comes �om the Gulfc. “Senior” and “junior” author cat-egories are collapsed, and all books compete togetherd. �e judges remain secret until the shortlist is announced

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Muammar Qadhafi

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1) d, 2) b, 3) c, 4) d, 5) d, 6) c, 7) b, 8) b, 9) b, 10) b, 11) b

Answer key

Dubbed by Bill Clinton “the Woodstock of the

Mind,” Hay Festival orga-nizers created another new prize of sorts in 2009: �ey assembled a special commi�ee to �nd and award the “39 best Arab authors under 39,” known as the Beirut39 list. Which of the following au-thors, who was called “perhaps the best writer of Arabic �ction alive” by Robin Yassin-Kassab in �e Guardian, was surprisingly le� o� the list?

a. Egyptian-Palestinian-American novelist Randa Jarrarb. Iraqi short-story writer Hassan Blasimc. Egyptian novelist Mohammad Salah al-Azabd. Lebanese poet Joumana Haddad

Which Egyptian resigned from the Beirut39 judging

panel in protest because the contest was not publicized broadly enough?

a. Zahi Hawassb. Alaa Al Aswanyc. Ahmed El Esseilyd. Youssef Boutros-Ghali

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6Of the following books, which has NOT won an

“Arabic Booker”?

a. Bahaa Taher’s “Sunset Oasis”b. Youssef Ziedan’s “�e Nabataen”c. Mohammed Achaari’s “�e Arch and the Bu�er�y”d. Abdo Khal’s “�rowing Sparks”

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Bahaa Taher’s ‘Sunset Oasis’

�e “Arabic Booker” has come under �re for the

sources of its funding, for being too “western,” and for not naming enough women on its long and shortlists. It was also criticized for working too hard to award women writers. Has a woman ever won the prize?

a. Nob. Yes, Saudi author Raja Alemc. Yes, Egyptian author Mansoura Ezz Eldind. Yes, Egyptian author Miral al-Tahawy

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Sheikh Zayed

Naguib Mahfouz

In 2010, the Sheikh Zayed literature prize was

awarded, and then with-drawn. Why?

a. �e winning author o�ended Sheikh Zayedb. It turned out the winning author had plagiarized sections from one of the judge’s booksc. �e author was actually deadd. �e author’s wife had re-ally wri�en the book

20 Life & Society28 June 2012

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Cogs in the wheelA day in the life of a Cairo bus driver

By Heba Helmy

“If you get stuck in a traffic jam all the time and have no other job to get to, there is nothing to do but to accept it,” says Abdel Fatah Hassan, a public bus driver with 10 years of experi-ence. Hassan believes this simple life philosophy allows him to handle his hectic daily work environment.

“Swerving through Cairo’s ultra-congested streets has taught me how to be patient,” he continues with a smile. “And that is the only advantage I gain from this job.”

Hassan’s eight-hour shift starts at 2 pm. He usually doesn’t wake up early, especially after spending time with his wife and four-year-old when he returns late from work.

He takes a microbus from his home at Helwan to Abdel Moneim Riyad Square, Cairo’s main public trans-portation hub. Hassan arrives ten minutes late but, he says, “It is not a big deal.” He never leaves immediate-ly, as he waits until passengers fill up some of the seats in the bus first.

“Sabah al-Ful!” he greets his col-leagues in a cheerful tone, asking for a cigarette from the driver who he changes shift with. It doesn’t take too long before the bus is loaded with people. He takes a long drag from his nearly- finished cigarette before he throws it into the street.

On his daily route from Tahrir Square to Hegaz Square in Helio-polis, Hassan picks up dozens of pas-sengers. Some signal the bus to stop by raising their arms, but this doesn’t always bring the bus to a halt.

“I can’t stop for everyone along the route or I will cause thousands of accidents,” Hassan says. Instead, he

often slows down so that passengers can run and catch the bus.

“This is the worst shift. It’s the time employees and students leave work and schools. You have nowhere to escape the congestion,” Hassan says, adding, “The worst is yet to come.”

He’s right. By 4 pm, traffic is at a standstill and the bus is packed with commuters. Purchasing a bus ticket, of course, does not guarantee a seat at peak time. For a handful of hours, people stand with the physical sup-port of each other’s bodies.

As the traffic remains paralyzed, Hassan gets out of his bus and buys take-out. While waiting for his ko-shary, he keeps an eye on the traffic light. His order is ready in time, and he returns behind the steering wheel before the light has changed color.

“I don’t have a break in the middle of the day. I am forced to grab some-thing to eat from the street, so I can survive the physical effort and pres-sures of the day,” Hassan says.

As things start to slow down at about 7 pm, Hassan uses one hand

to maneuver his way through traffic and the other to eat from his plastic koshary container.

The day goes smoothly, until a quarrel sparks suddenly between Hassan and a policeman in the bus, whose shouts draw the attention of passengers.

“Stop here,” the policeman says repeatedly in an angry tone. “I told you I cannot drop you off in the middle of the street. It is too danger-ous, I’d collide with cars if I did so,” Hassan replies.

When the policeman insists on getting off the bus at an authorized stop, Hassan slows down towards the sidewalk till he comes to a full stop.

As the policeman leaves the bus, Hassan murmurs, “Cops will never change. Even after the revolution, they still treat people as slaves.

“If I didn’t drop him off where he wanted, he would have issued a ticket for traffic violations that costs my whole salary.”

According to Hassan, traffic fines — which are deducted from drivers’ salaries — begin at LE500 and can amount to as much as LE1000.

“I am not against facing penalties for breaking the rules, but the maxi-

mum fine should be fair and not more than we can afford,” he says. “If I get four tickets a year, my fam-ily and I will go without money for months.”

Hassan’s monthly income, includ-ing bonuses, does not exceed LE500. Back in Abdel Moneim Riyad Square, Hassan and a group of col-leagues chitchat about the election results over tea.

Hassan was one of the workers who joined the public transportation strike last March.

The workers demanded an end-of-service payment equivalent to the sum of 100 monthly salaries, and to affiliate the Public Transport Author-ity with the Transportation Ministry.

Members of the Public Transport Workers Syndicate submitted their demands to Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri in a last-ditch attempt after leaving a meeting with the gov-ernor of Cairo empty-handed. Public transportation syndicate members organized a sit-in inside their buses in front of the cabinet headquarters until their demands were met.

“The sit-in ended with a list of promises and nothing has been done,” he says.

Before heading back home at 10 pm, he seems exhausted and sleep lingers in his eyes, “We’ve nothing to do but hope the Islamists will take our demands into account after gain-ing power,” Hassan concludes in a bitter tone.

Read more from the “Cogs in the wheel” series which takes a magnifying glass to one person, a representative of a job that keeps the city ticking. Visit www.egyptindependent.com/taxono-my/term/261161. ■

If I didn’t drop him off where he wanted, he would have issued a ticket for traffic violations that costs my whole salary

Bus driver Abdel Fatah Hassan behind the wheel

Hassan’s shift covers rush hour

21Life & Society28 June 2012

By Nadine Ibrahimear Tahrir Square, in the alley between Youssef al-Guindy Street and Mo-hamed Sidy Street, behind

pine-green shuttered doors, lies Fa-sahat Somaya — a small one-woman, one-kitchen restaurant that serves home-style Egyptian food with a dash of politics and sass.

Loosely translated and widely known as “Somaya’s kitchen,” Somaya says a ‘fasaha,’ in Arabic, is “like the living room but a little bit different. It is where people gather to eat and to sit with each other. So this is Fasahat Somaya.”

It is not just a restaurant but a place to gather and enjoy the comforts of delectable local dishes with the sound and ambience of Egyptian culture.

Somaya opened her restaurant on 22 October, in the lull between the Maspero violence at the state TV building and the November unrest on Mohamed Mahmoud Street. The walls, decorated with old photographs of Cairo in the early 1900s, are also lit-tered with political posters and pro-revolutionary, anti-military regime stickers. Groups of young men and women sit around the colorful blue and green tables, smoking cigarettes and avidly discussing politics — often with Somaya.

“This political style did not hap-pen on purpose,” Somaya says, as old French accordion music plays in the background.

“At the time of the revolution, we used to gather and eat together in the Square. There was a large group of us who would sit and eat ‘Somaya’s food.’ We had a specific spot where we would convene, but we wanted a place where we could eat comfort-ably, talk comfortably and agree on [politics] comfortably. So my friends pressured me to open up a restau-rant,” she says.

The political atmosphere — insep-arable from her food — was cooked up with the dishes.

Across from Fasahat Somaya is a small cafe with a few green lawn chairs placed outside. People wait for a table to open up while drinking tea and smoking shisha there. The cafe often brings your tea into the res-taurant or puts your shisha on hold if you haven’t quite finished before a table frees up. The restaurant only holds about 15 people at once, or 20 if customers get creative with seating arrangements. More often than not, tables are taken by those who have long finished eating but are wrapped up in heated conversation.

It is a real revolutionary home, built by a fiery Egyptian woman with a pas-sion for cooking and a knack for keep-ing even the shyest eater coming back. She has a solid customer base with no need for advertising.

“I serve a lot of foreigners,” Somaya says. “I know that foreigners are al-ways on the lookout. They want to eat good food, they want a place that

is clean, they want someone who yells and someone who looks unique and different, like me.”

Only a moment earlier, our conver-sation had been interrupted by So-maya yelling at someone not to come back, chuckling all the while.

“But really, I always say that foreign-ers know this country better than [Egyptians] do. To begin with, the majority of them come by themselves! No one brought them. They would just be walking around, looking, and so they find me,” she says.

The food itself is reminiscent of din-ner at a typical Egyptian household. Somaya makes the food in bulk on the spot and often has to make more than one batch to feed guests. She is not like other restaurants, she insists, that

serve quick and unhealthy food, such as French fries or boftek, thin slices of meat that are breaded and fried. She serves “akl al-beit,” or home food — the often time-consuming and skill-fully prepared food that one usually finds only in their mother’s kitchen.

Because there is no set daily menu, you have to go up and ask Somaya what she’s making. Among the dishes she makes are molokhiya, a tradition-al soup; seasoned chicken; kawaraa, a broth made from beef ankle and spices; okra and rice; mombar, a sau-sage stuffed with meat, rice and herbs; mahshi, eggplant or other vegetables stuffed with rice; and fattah, rice baked with tomato bread and topped with a tomato-based salsa. All of them are consistently delicious and taste-fully prepared.

She is inspired by the kind of food she had growing up at her house or at her friends’ houses after school. But she didn’t learn how to cook in her mother’s kitchen.

“I learned how to cook in Italy,” she says. “I finished my studies and I traveled with my ex-husband. I didn’t know anything when I went there — I didn’t even know how to fry an egg! I loved him so much, though, that I wanted him to eat the best food. So, in my 10 years in Italy, I watched [the Italians] cook, I ate, I experimented and I loved.”

A lot of her dishes are inspired by classical Egyptian food, with a unique twist.

“I learned how to make ‘mahshi’ over there, with cabbage leaves. They don’t make these things, but they have similar meals,” she explains. “You know, one always wants to bring their country with them wher-ever they are. I used to teach myself from what I saw and adapt the dishes to be Egyptian.”

Mahshi, which can be stuffed grape leaves, cabbage leaves, peppers, zuc-chini or eggplant, is one of Somaya’s most popular staples and a well-known Egyptian dish. She makes a wide array of different mahshi every Saturday. Every day of the week has a different selection of dishes, with usu-ally about three to four choices each evening, but Saturday and Thursday are set dates.

“I usually play around so that I don’t get bored,” she says. “During the week, I make new dishes and I try new things.”

A meal at Fasahat Somaya, which sometimes includes more than one dish, will cost anywhere from LE15 to LE30. All the food tastes amazing and the prices expose an emphasis on building community rather than profit.

The warm, friendly atmosphere hardly ever sees a dull moment, and Somaya — who is there every day, cooking, conversing and laughing — will quickly become an addiction to comfort food that you just can’t kick.

“I opened this restaurant because I deeply love cooking,” she says.■

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Somaya serves up another homemade special

A selection of Somaya’s delicious dishes

The flavor of politicsAt Somaya’s, conversation is the main course

It is a real revolutionary home, built by a fiery Egyptian woman with a passion for cooking and a knack for keeping even the shyest eater coming back

Groups of young menand women sit around the colorful blue and green tables,smoking cigarettes and avidly discussing politics — often with Somaya

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22 Travel28 June 2012

Marsa Alam is one of those places where all thesenses are ignited

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An island tree

Places not to be missed are Golaan, a pro-tected mangrove garden with what looks like a tree in the middle of the sea. It’s a wonderful place to relax and spend the day enjoying the beautiful surroundings. �ere’s a small café that serves lunch, but patrons should notify the restaurant sta� before coming so they can make the necessary preparations. Moreover, to support the local community, travelers can buy selected handicra�s on their way in or out.

�ere are numerous diving and snorkel-ing locations just o� the shore. Honkorab is a popular bay for snorkelers and divers, as is Marsa Samadai — both are pristine beaches. Beachgoers should take something to sit on and their own food and drink, and most im-portantly, make them take all their waste with them when they leave.

For the less adventurous traveler or those wanting to be pampered, Abu Dabbab is the place to visit. It can get quite crowded during the high season since it’s a popular diving and snorkeling site that also o�ers basic services like toilets, a beach bar and small souvenir shops, as well as comfortable chaises longues to lie on and umbrellas. It is said that this is

the spot to keep an eye out for dugongs.For those looking to avoid the typical over-

crowded and overdeveloped beach scene, Tondoba Bay is just 10 km south of Marsa Alam. �e reef here is quite pleasant and there are quite a few dive sites worth exploring.

A big hit in Marsa Alam is the Dolphin House reef, also known as Sho’ab Samadai. A few years ago, a group of divers worked on making this a protected area and succeeded. �anks to them, the dolphins are now pro-tected from human interference as much as possible. Only 10 boats are allowed into Sho’ab Samadai daily, under strict supervi-sion. �e reef is about an hour away from the shore by boat.

�e reef is split into three areas: A, B and C. No one is allowed into Area A as this is only for the dolphins. Area B is just for snorkelers and if the dolphins are in a good mood, they will come and swim with the snorkelers. Area C is for divers. �e dives here are magni�cent, complete with beautiful underwater caves and pinnacles. It’s de�nitely worth visiting, even if it means sharing a boat with people you don’t know.

If you are a wreck explorer, go to Abu Ghusun, which is less frequented by tour-ists than many other spots on the coast. �e wreck itself is next to the reef and is a very pleasant dive. Make sure not to miss the tele-phone hanging o� the wreck’s side.

Elphinstone is the place most people visit Marsa Alam for. However, only experienced divers are allowed to dive here and snorkel-ing is forbidden. Most dive trips are either at the northern or southern reef. Depending on where you’re diving, you’re likely to bump into reef sharks, barracudas, angel�sh snap-pers, Napoleon Fish, and oceanic white tips if you’re lucky.

For a di�erent day out, Wadi al-Gamal Na-tional Park is not to be missed. Inside are the remains of an ancient Roman village as well as emerald mines. �e drive there is breathtak-ing with regular sightings of wild camels, mi-grating birds, and the occasional rare gazelle.

By some small miracle, preservation e�orts have helped control development in Marsa Alam but it is an ongoing ba�le. �ose inter-ested in preservation e�orts should visit the Hurghada Environmental Protection and Conservation Association’s website at www.hepca.com.■

Sand and sea pilgrimageA trip through the beaches of Marsa AlamA trip through the beaches of Marsa Alam

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By Rana Nessim

arsa Alam is de�nitely one of Egypt’s most underrated destina-tions. Although many violations against the environment and its

natural heritage have taken place here over the years, it still holds some of the most beau-tiful and pristine beaches in the country.

�e drive there is a long, yet enjoyable one. Most of the journey is along the coast with the Red Sea in view. Travelers get a good idea of what living by the sea is like and how di�erent the towns, �shing villages and cities there are.

Unlike the road to Sinai, it’s a much more relaxed drive. For those who would rather not drive, there are daily �ights as well as buses.

Marsa Alam is one of those places where all the senses are ignited. It’s a haven for divers, kitesurfers and snorkelers. Some of the best dive sites in the world are said to be here.

Parts of the coast are packed with tourists for much of the year, but luckily, the best plac-es are hidden in nooks and crannies further south.

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You’re likely to bump into reef sharks, barracudas, angelfish snappers, Napoleon Fish, and oceanic white tips if you’re lucky

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Oxygen tanks and �shing boats

A young boy casts a �shing net

23Listings28 June 2012

‘Sit Down. I tell you a story’Mauro L’Abate and Consuelo Costa’s exhibition takes the chair – the most basic, everyday object – as a starting point, and from there uses photographs and texts to extrapolate stories and change viewers’ perceptions of the subject. “Sit Down. I tell you a story” runs until 7 July.

Mashrabia Gallery8 Champollion St., Downtown, Cairo0100-170- 4554www.mashrabiagallery.org

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Clown, mime and street performances

‘Mafrouza,’ part III

Meetphool.net is organizing an evening of performances that will include: Noon’s “Hara TV” interactive theater, a perfor-mance by the Alexandrian HS Clowns, mime, pantomime and poetry by the Fayoum-based Lesah Troupe, and storytelling events by Heba Radwan.

30 June, 7-9 pmAl-Madina Studio and Anas al-Wogoud Cafe8 Talaat Harb St., Downtown, Cairo0111-791-1133http://www.meetphool.net/

Episode 3 of the five-part documentary “Mafrouza” will be screened this week at the French Cultural Center. For more than a decade now, French filmmaker Emmanuelle Demoris, has been working on creating a portrait of the work-ing class district of Mafrouza, near the docks in Alexandria.

1 July, 7 pmFrench Cultural CenterMadrasset al-Huquq al-Ferens-siya St., Mounira, Downtown, Cairo022-791-5800

EftekasatFormed in 2001, this indepen-dent music band has developed an ever-growing fan base, and for good reason. Eftekasat was among the first bands in Egypt to fuse Jazz, blues, Latin, funk and Oriental sounds to create their own unique sound.

1 July, 10 pmCairo Jazz Club197, 26th July St., Agouza, Cairo0106-880- 4764www.cairojazzclub.com

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Hara TV

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‘Noodle Soup’Artist Hatem Helmy explores our visually saturated environ-ment and what he calls a state of “post-rationalism” in Egypt with a collection of digital and mixed media works. The exhibition will also include a guest appearance by graffiti artist Sad Panda. It runs from 29 June until 1 July, and is open from 10 to 3 pm and 6 to 10 pm.

Anthropologie Gallery13A Marashly St., Zamalek, Cairo022-7361268

‘Lost Gods’

‘Supermarket’

American artist Joshua Goode’s interactive exhibi-tion, “Lost Gods” at Darb 1718, asks visitors to find complete figures or fragments of figurines and then display them on a shelf or table. Goode plays on the value associated with such figurines and their role in revisiting historical knowledge, and directly contrasts it with the abundance of history at our feet in Egypt. “Lost Gods” starts on 30 June.

Darb 1718Kasr El Shamaa St., Old Cairo, 022-361- 0511www.darb1718.com

A collective exhibition orga-nized by a group of indepen-dent artists in cooperation with Studio Khana for Culture Development, “Supermarket” examines the behaviors and thoughts of the consumerist society that the artists feel dominate Egyptian life.

“Noodle Soup” exhibition at Anthropologie Gallery“Noodle Soup” exhibition at

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“Supermarket” runs until 4 July.

Gezira Art Center1 al-Sheik al-Marsafy St., Zamalek, Cairo022-737-3298

tians to engage a wide range of listeners.28 June, 8:30 pmEl Genaina TheatreAl Azhar park, Salah Salem Road, Darassa, Cairo02-362-5057

Taxi BandThis up-and-coming band of musicians will be performing at El Genaina Theater this Thursday. Through its lively music and lyrics written by band member Mohamed Taw-fiq, the bank seeks to tackle the problems facing young Egyp-

MadoAfter a two-year absence, Mo-hamed Abdel Aal, aka Mado, is back with a live performance at Sawy Culture Wheel. Mado composes and writes his own music, inspired by the works of Sheikh Imam, Sayyed Darwish, Ziad Rahbani and Fayrouz among others.

30 June, 8:00 pmSawy Culture Wheel26th of July St., Zamalek, Cairo0100-099-9994www.culturewheel.com

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Issue no.728 June 2012

24

Asahby أ�ساحبي�]a-SAH-bee[

Translation: O my friend (slang)Idioms: A’atef asahby 1. Calling out a friend, in a post-slang

manner. 2. Through mispronunciation of let-

ters and needless tampering with pre-fixes, you get street slang that catches on.

3. You can say this if you’re trying to be annoying or get away with saying something ridiculous, or dead serious.

Examples:Do not pluck a dead chicken’s feath-

ers before dunking it in hot water asah-by, otherwise you’ll cook a feathery meal.

Listen, asahby, you can be president, but you can’t run the military. You are president, but you cannot be in charge of security or justice, asahby. You have someone to answer to. It’s not the people, and you can just call him, “amosheer.”

I have something very important to tell you aJonathan asahby, it’s a matter of life and death.■

WORD ON THE STREET

Printed by Al-Masry Media Corp