The Muslim Brotherhood declared early Monday that its candidate, Mohammed Mursi, won Egypt’s presidential election over Hosni Mubarak’s last prime minister Ahmad Shafiq.
But the military handed itself the lion’s share power over the new president, sharpening the possibility of confrontation. With parliament dissolved and martial law effectively in force, the generals issued an interim constitution granting themselves sweeping authorities that ensure their hold on the state and subordinate the president.
The Muslim Brotherhood said Sunday it did not recognize the dissolution of parliament, where it was the largest party. It also rejected the military’s right to issue an interim constitution and oversee the drafting of a new one.
Official final results are not due until Thursday, and Shafiq’s campaign challenged the Brotherhood claim, which was based on the group’s compilation of election officials’ returns from nearly all polling centers nationwide.
But at their campaign headquarters, the Brotherhood officials and supporters were ebullient over the turn of fate.
In a victory speech at the headquarters, Mursi said he seeks “stability, love and brotherhood for the Egyptian civil, national, democratic, constitutional and modern state”.
“Thank God, who successfully led us to this blessed revolution. Thank God, who guided the people of Egypt to this correct path, the road of freedom, democracy,” the 60-year-old U.S.-educated engineer declared.
He vowed to all Egyptians, “men, women, mothers, sisters … all political factions, the Muslims, the Christians” to be “a servant for all of them.” “We are not about taking revenge or settling scores. We are all brothers of this nation, we own it together, and we are equal in rights and duties.”
“Down with military rule,” the supporters chanted at the headquarters.
“The next phase is more difficult. We must all unite against the oppressive rule of the military council,” MB founder Ahmed Maher said.
By the group’s count, Mursi took 13.2 million votes, or 51.8 percent, to Shafiq’s 48.1 percent out of 25.5 million votes with more than 99 percent of the more than 13,000 poll centers counted.
The Brotherhood’s early, partial counts proved generally accurate in last month’s first round vote.
The Shafiq campaign accused the Brotherhood of “deceiving the people” by declaring victory. A campaign spokesman on the independent ONTV channel said counting was still going on with Shafiq slightly ahead so far.
June 18, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | Ahmed Maher, Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood, Shafiq, Supreme Council of Armed Forces |
Leave a comment
The Muslim Brotherhood has rejected the military’s decision to dissolve the Egyptian parliament and has demanded that a referendum be held on the issue.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which secured the biggest bloc of seats in two rounds of parliamentary elections in December 2011 and January 2012, issued a statement on Saturday saying “dangerous days” were ahead and the political gains of the revolution that toppled former dictator Hosni Mubarak on February 11, 2011 could be wiped out.
The parliament should only be dissolved by a popular referendum, and the order to dissolve the assembly “represents a coup against the whole democratic process,” the statement added.
The Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) — the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood — said in another statement that the decision showed the military council’s desire to “take possession of all powers despite the will of the people.”
Egypt’s ruling military council formally announced the dissolution of the parliament on Saturday following a Supreme Court ruling earlier in the week.
Some critics have compared the move to the beginning of Algeria’s civil war in 1992, when the army cancelled an election an Islamic party was winning.
Egyptians are casting their ballots in a two-day presidential runoff election that began on Saturday and runs until Sunday which pits the candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party, Mohammed Morsi, against former Prime Minister Ahmad Shafiq.
More than 50 million people are eligible to vote.
Early results of expatriates’ votes show Morsi has won 78 percent.
The ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) has vowed to hand over power to the winner of the election by July 1.
Many Egyptians fear that Shafiq is the undeclared candidate of the junta and that the military-appointed election committee overseeing the election will rig the vote in favor of Shafiq.
Angry Egyptian protesters have held many demonstrations across the country in which they urged the authorities to ban all remnants of the Mubarak regime from running as candidates in elections.
June 16, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception | Ahmed Shafik, Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood, Parliament of Egypt, Supreme Council of the Armed Forces |
Leave a comment
The masks dropped. The cards are shown.
For over a year, Egyptians have wondered who was leading the efforts to frustrate and obliterate their nascent revolution, or what was dubbed in the local media as the “third party” or the “hidden bandit.”
But the mystery is no more.
It was none other than the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), the same body that took power from deposed president Hosni Mubarak under the guise of leading the transitional period towards democracy. It was a masterful work of political art.
The final act was on display on Thursday, June 14, 2012, when Egypt’s High Constitutional Court (HCC) not only ruled against banning the military’s candidate and Mubarak’s last Prime Minister, Gen. Ahmad Shafiq, but also dissolved parliament, the only institution that represented the political will of the people in post-revolutionary Egypt. It is important to note that all the justices on the HCC were appointed by Mubarak, and that most if not all are considered regime loyalists.
Incidentally, last March, Parliamentary Speaker and MB leader, Dr. Saad Katatni, said that he was told, in the presence of SCAF’s deputy commander, Gen. Sami Anan, by SCAF’s appointed Prime Minister Dr. Kamal Ganzouri, that the order to dissolve the parliament was in the drawer but would come at the appropriate time.
This dramatic announcement was therefore followed by the parliament passing a law banning most of the former senior officials of the Mubarak regime (including Shafiq) from politics on the grounds of corrupting Egypt’s political life and institutions for decades. Nevertheless, Shafiq was shortly reinstated by the Presidential Elections Commission (PEC) even though it had no jurisdiction on the matter. It is perhaps important to note that the head of the PEC is also the Chief Justice of the HCC. He declared on the same day that the parliamentary elections’ law (that resulted in the victory of the Islamic parties, led by the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), winning seventy five percent of the seats) was unconstitutional. It was the same law that several of the same justices assured all political parties last summer that it passed constitutional muster.
With this brazen act of thwarting the political will of the Egyptian people, the emerging Islamic and revolutionary parties have now been totally stripped of their political ascendency, less than five months after their rise to power. This was accomplished simply by utilizing the institutions of the deep state crafted by a regime that was controlled for decades by corrupt officials, senior military officers, and intelligence agencies. Further, a Mubarak era military man is now on the verge of being “elected” president using the assorted tools of the democratic process.
One of the major demands of the revolution was to end the three-decade old emergency law that allowed the security agencies and the military to arbitrarily arrest and abuse the civil and human rights of any activist at will. But under tremendous public pressure throughout last year, these laws were repealed at the end of last May. But what was kicked out of the door crawled back through the window. Egypt’s Justice Minister announced this week, less than two weeks after the repeal went into effect, that he was empowering all military officers and intelligence personnel to arrest indefinitely any person deemed a security threat to public order.
In a transparently coordinated fashion, before parliament could react to this shameless challenge to the essence of the revolution, it was dissolved within 24 hours by the High Court. Further, within minutes of the decision to dissolve the parliament, hundreds of military and security officers occupied its buildings, preventing any member to enter or even clear their offices. In short, Egypt has come a full circle, the transition to democracy was aborted, the process hijacked, and its remarkable revolution put on life support.
The final act of quietly killing the hopes of Egypt’s youth and the aspirations of its people is coming this Sunday when the presidential elections end in the declaration of a Shafiq presidency. The other candidate in this charade is represented by the MB’s Dr. Muhammad Mursi. For weeks, the MB has been warning against elections fraud perpetrated by the institutions of the deep state and led by its security and intelligence services.
For example, the Elections Commission has refused to hand over the voter lists, which it had no problem doing last winter during the parliamentary elections. But the problem is that these same lists have now increased by a whopping 4.5 million voters, raising suspicions of multiple registrations of regime loyalists who might vote multiple times in different provinces over the two-day elections process (for example 200 thousand regime loyalists voting in twenty different precincts.) Furthermore, elections officials announced that they would refuse to allow elections’ monitors to stay in the same rooms where the ballot boxes are left unattended for 12 hours between the first and the second days of the elections, although they were allowed to stay in and watch the boxes overnight in the previous parliamentary elections last winter.
In addition, the government announced that it is giving all its 6 million employees a two-day vacation and free public transportation to boost participation (an indirect prodding of government employees and their families to vote for Shafiq). In a blatant violation of elections’ laws, hundreds of millions of pounds have been spent on media propaganda to boost SCAF’s candidate, as well as payments to local officials especially in the delta region, to secure the peasants’ votes.
In a nutshell, the intense involvement of the security state is now in the open. But most Egyptians are frustrated and feel that they have been robbed of making a choice consistent with their sixteen-month popular uprising. Before their own eyes they see how the Mubarak regime is slowly being re-invented with the full backing of state institutions under the direction of SCAF, the same military that promised to fulfill the objectives of the revolution.
Most pro-revolution groups, activists, and public intellectuals have called on MB’s candidate Mursi to withdraw from the presidential elections so as to deny the military’s candidate any claim of legitimacy once he is “elected.” But in its desperate attempt to show any achievement in its one-year dalliance with SCAF, it appears that the MB is pressing ahead with the elections. Once again the Islamic group has demonstrated its inability to join in, let alone lead, any revolutionary path, even though its leaders understand fully the determination of SCAF and the state institutions to manipulate the elections and force their candidate on the rest of the people.
During his final interview before the elections, Mursi understood the stakes and his long electoral odds as the elections are being manipulated. Although he believed that he would easily win in free and fair elections, he admitted that elections’ fraud were certain to take place. He further said that he was recently told by President Jimmy Carter that Mubarak was for decades “sleeping in Israel’s bed,” and that “Shafiq would follow in his footsteps.” The former president, who raised many concerns about the first round elections, had earlier stated that he did not believe that the military would hand over power to civilian rule.
Meanwhile, Shafiq, who does not deny his admiration for Mubarak and considers him a role model, has brazenly declared that his first state visit would be to the U.S. in order to signal that he was its preferred candidate. He also said that he would not only keep the peace treaty with Israel, but would also deepen it.
Thus, the MB’s delusion that SCAF will allow it to contest power will soon be exposed. Sooner or later the group will realize that it simply can neither outmaneuver nor win against the military or the deep security state on its own. It will have to fundamentally change its strategic choices and genuinely adopt the revolutionary path in order to defeat the entrenched interests of the deep state. Even if by some miracle their candidate wins the election, the past year has demonstrated that in every state-controlled institution, including the judiciary, no real change will take place unless all the counter-revolutionary elements are purged, a concept that is lost on the MB’s leadership that is used to slow approach reforms or behind-the-scenes questionable deals to preserve its interests.
Disappointed, yet again, with the MB’s attitude to ignore their consensus, most of the revolutionary groups have vowed to press on with their revolution that has been deeply, but not yet gravely, wounded. Former presidential candidate Dr. Abdel Moneim Abol Fotouh, a favorite among many revolutionary and youth groups, has declared that the latest decisions by the High Court allowing the candidacy of Shafiq and the dissolution of parliament were nothing short of a soft coup d’état orchestrated by the military. He called for the immediate establishment of a revolutionary leadership council comprised of all pro-revolution groups and leaders to challenge the military hold on power and Shafiq’s inevitable presidency.
Sensing these threats dozens of such groups that have sacrificed so much since the early days of the revolution, have vowed to join in and continue the difficult struggle to dislodge the military and achieve the main objective of the revolution in establishing a true democratic civil state and ending the culture of the deep security state. Thousands have taken to the streets, while hundreds started a sit-in in Tahrir Square.
They now quietly admit that a hard lesson has been learned. This time their slogan is not “the people and the army are one.” Rather their cry is: “This time we are serious, we will not leave it (the revolution) to anyone.”
Esam Al-Amin can be contacted at alamin1919@gmail.com
June 15, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception | Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, Jimmy Carter, Mubarak, Muslim Brotherhood, SCAF, Supreme Council of Armed Forces |
Leave a comment
14.2 million Egyptians live on less than one US dollar a day
A new Egypt demands a new constitution and president. Many pressing questions also need to be addressed, including the religious-secular divide, the value of Sharia in the making of law, citizenship, minority rights, the rule of civil society, foreign policy, and much more.
One issue that requires urgent attention in the current discussion is that of Egypt’s shattered economy. In the first round of elections on May 23, Egypt’s presidential candidates appeared to hold vastly different ideas regarding their vision for the future. With the elimination of independent candidate Hamdeen Sabahy before the final round on June 16-17, the economic program for the two remaining candidates seemed oddly similar and suspiciously familiar.
The oddity stems from the fact that the two contenders – Freedom and Justice Party candidate Mohamed Mursi and former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq – are supposed to represent the two extremes defining Egypt after the 2011 revolution. Mursi is a Muslim Brotherhood figure, long oppressed by the very regime that Shafiq dutifully served.
The “run-off in Egypt’s presidential elections between the two most polarizing candidates has escalated investor concerns of renewed unrest,” claimed Arabia Monitor, a market research company. However, both candidates are united by their advocacy of the same free market economy, the guiding model for the discredited Mubarak regime. The news is hardly shocking in the case of Shafiq, an establishment man who would not be expected to challenge Egypt’s chronic inequality; Mursi’s position is bewildering.
While “rivals portray the Brotherhood as a nebulous organization obsessed with religion,” according to Patrick Werr, “its wide-ranging plan, details of which were revealed during the buildup to last month’s first-round presidential vote, projects a pragmatism that puts rapid economic growth ahead of ideology.” The Brotherhood ‘pragmatism’ is only commended here because it promotes “a strongly free-market economic plan” and a pledge to move quickly to secure a loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Some estimates put Egypt’s current debt at close to $190 billion. The Egyptian revolution, which in part sought economic justice and equitable distribution of wealth, is yet to produce a new economic reality. Under Mubarak, the economy operated through a selective interpretation of free market economy marred by extreme corruption in favor of the ruling elite. Over 15 months of haggling between the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), angry masses, a new elected parliament and other forces have now wreaked havoc on an already struggling economy. The Egyptian pound is facing the prospect of ‘disorderly devaluation.’ The IMF’s original loan offer of $3.2 billion, rejected by Egypt at the time, would not be enough to rectify the damage. Per Egyptian government and IMF estimates, the country requires $10-12 billion to secure the pound.
Currency devaluation is only a small aspect of Egypt’s current economic woes. The Economist (May 19-25) reported that Egypt’s foreign exchange reserve is now down to third of its value of 15 months ago and the budget deficit has surged to 10 percent of GDP. “The budget shortfall could be resolved by a stroke of scrapping energy subsidies, but in a country where 40% of people live in poverty; this is a sizzling political potato.”
It is actually much more than a ‘sizzling political potato’. The handling of the economy will ultimately make or break the relationship between Egypt’s new rulers and its people – most of whom are not only politically disfranchised, but economically marginalized as well.
Although most Egyptians now frown at Mubarak’s legacy, the country’s economic indicators were for years perceived favorably by Western financial institutions. After all Egypt recorded steady growth. Its ‘economic reforms’ post 1991 were largely celebrated for further liberalizing trade and investment, cutting subsidies (thus forcing the poor to continue teetering at the edge of poverty and utter desolation) and dismantling the public sector. The IMF and other Western lending institutions do not settle for anything but more austerity measures – regardless of whether Egypt’s new president is a bearded Muslim or an avowed liberal. The only ideology that matters for the IMF is the free market economy.
So what must be done for the almost 14.2 million people who live on less than one US dollar a day? 1.5 million Egyptian currently live in a large graveyard at the outskirts of Cairo. Austerity and further cuts could only lead to the kind of misery that instigated last year’s revolution.
Egypt’s remaining candidates promise to revive the economy while keeping social justice on the agenda. While Shafiq has promised an abundance of perks to various sectors of society, the Brotherhood has been promoting a detailed program called Al-Nahda, or The Renaissance. Enlisting the help of internationally renowned economists such as Peru’s Hernando de Soto Polar, Al-Nahda is reportedly a study of many economic models around the world, including Turkey, Malaysia and South Africa.
The Brotherhood’s initial presidential candidate, Khairat al-Shater was the “driving force behind the project,” according to the Daily Beast (June 7). In an interview last April, he laid down the basic premise of his plan: “The Egyptian economy must rely to a very, very large degree on the private sector. The priority is for Egyptian investors, then Arab then foreign.”
It is expected that Egypt’s intense public discussions in the current phase will be fixed on foundational issues such as the formation of a constitutional assembly and a redefinition of the rule of SCAF. But Egypt’s economy is deeply flawed. An IMF-style free market economy is of no use to millions of Egyptians when they lack proper education and the most basic rights and opportunities. For an Egyptian day laborer to have a better life in a country with a huge and growing income gap between rich and poor, something fundamental needs to take place.
Referencing ‘social justice’ while negotiating IMF loans suggests a precarious start for any truly fundamental economic reforms. While Hamdeen Sabahy is no longer in the race to challenge the free market wisdom of his contenders, the debate must not end here.
June 14, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Economics | Ahmed Shafik, Al-Nahda, Egypt, Mubarak, Supreme Council of the Armed Forces |
Leave a comment
The Charade is Over
When deposed Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and his sons were indicted in April 2011, legal observers cynically noted that the charges were not only politically motivated in order to quiet the massive demonstrations demanding their trial, but also that they were so weak that the trial might have been designed to end in acquittals.
Initially, eleven people were indicted on two sets of charges. The first batch included Mubarak, his two sons, and his old friend and former intelligence officer turned businessman, Hussein Salem. Salem came to prominence after the peace treaty with Israel was signed in 1979, when he became the point man in Egypt for the American aid that poured in as a result of the Camp David accords.
At the time, Hussein was acting as a private contractor, receiving tens of millions of dollars in commissions related to the American military and economic aid. By the mid 1980s, the Pentagon was so concerned with his financial corruption and over-billing that it threatened to indict him unless he was removed from the process. He was subsequently barred from entering the U.S.
Hussein then focused on domestic business ventures, constructing massive tourist resorts on the Red Sea, especially at Sharm Al-Sheikh, attracting European and American tourists. In exchange for getting prime land from the state for his projects on the cheap, he gave Mubarak and his sons five villas at practically no cost. This transaction that took place in the 1990s was the basis of the first set of charges against the Mubarak family for corruption and exchanging influence for financial gain. It should also be mentioned that it was Hussein that owned the private company that bought Egyptian natural gas and sold it to Israel at significantly below market prices, pocketing tens of millions of dollars as a result. Several former Mubarak aids believe that his sons were also silent partners on this incredible deal. For many years the Mubarak regime protected this inequitable transaction before it was scrapped this year under public pressure.
Out of the billions of dollars illegally made by the Mubaraks over the years, the state prosecutor (who himself was also appointed by Mubarak) chose this rotten but insignificant deal from the 90s to indict the former ruling family, knowing fully well that in Egypt the statute of limitation is three years for misdemeanors and ten years for felonies.
The second set of charges were against Mubarak’s security people led by former interior minister Gen. Habib Al-Adly and six of his most brutal senior assistants, including the heads of State Security, Central Security, as well as Cairo and Giza Security apparatuses. It was these security agencies, with over three hundred thousand officers, that cracked down on the protesters killing more than one thousand in the early days of the revolution in January 2011.
Although the two sets of charges on their face were unrelated, they were deliberately joined together in order to give the appearance that Mubarak and his sons were tried because of the security crackdown. But the revolutionary youth took to the streets in April and May of last year, forcing the state prosecutor to include Mubarak on the second set of charges of ordering and conspiring to kill the protesters.
Dating back to the nineteenth century, Egypt’s judiciary is considered one of the oldest modern judiciary systems in the world, earning a fine reputation and an independent tradition. However, as in every authoritarian regime, senior judges were appointed for decades by a dictatorial president so that they could rule in favor of his regime at crucial times. During the past year the world has witnessed how Mubarak-appointed senior judges corrupted the judicial process for political purposes at crucial moments.
One example was manifested this year during the standoff between Egypt’s state prosecutors and the United States after the indictment of 19 American pro-democracy workers. They were charged with operating several unregistered organizations that interfered in the Egyptian political process. In the midst of the pre-trial hearings and under tremendous pressure from the U.S. government, the head of Cairo’s Appeals Court called the chief prosecutor and pressured him to grant the Americans bail. Within two hours of the Americans posting bail, they were smuggled outside Egypt on an American military plane, escaping their day in court. Interestingly, the Republican-led House of Representatives has subsequently deducted the $5 million bail from this fiscal year’s aid to Egypt.
Another example of compromised judges is the head of the Presidential Elections Commission (PEC). Constitutionally, the PEC in Egypt is made up of five senior judicial positions, and is headed by the Chief Justice of Egypt’s Supreme Constitutional Court. That man is Justice Farouk Sultan. Traditionally the head of the highest court in the country is its most senior justice. But not this time. Sultan was a military judge for many years but Mubarak promoted him within a three-year period to first head a district court in 2006, and then appointed him as the head of the Supreme Court in 2009. Many legal and political experts believe that Mubarak chose him for that position in order to orchestrate the rise of his son, Gamal to the presidency that was supposed to have taken place in 2011 had Mubarak survived.
During the recent presidential elections, the PEC received some twenty appeals from various presidential candidates. But the only one accepted was the appeal of Gen. Ahmad Shafiq. As the last prime minister of the Mubarak regime, Shafiq was barred from politics for ten years by parliament in March of this year. However, Sultan and the PEC ruled that this law was unconstitutional although the commission did not have the legal authority to overturn the law, as it was administrative in nature and not judicial (despite being comprised of judges).
As Mubarak’s trial (dubbed in Egypt as ‘The Trial of the Century’) was underway, the political charade became more transparent. The Mubarak-appointed judge Ahmad Rifaat, who chaired the 3-judge panel overseeing the trial, refused to transfer Mubarak to the prison hospital and instead kept him in a military hospital where he enjoyed the perks of a former president. He allowed several senior Mubarak officials to testify, including former Vice President Omar Suleiman, military chief and Egypt’s effective ruler since Feb. 2011, Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, as well as two former interior ministers.
All of these witnesses tried to absolve Mubarak from any culpability in the security crackdown on the peaceful protesters. Court records released recently show that whenever the frustrated prosecutors tried to get details by asking these senior officials probing questions or through demonstrating inconsistencies in their testimonies, the presiding judge would interrupt and not allow the questioning to proceed. As the trial ended last February, Judge Rifaat said he would announce his ruling on the trial on June 2, in the midst of the presidential elections.
Since the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) took over the reign of power in the country in February of last year promising a transition to democracy, the struggle has been between two conflicting visions for Egypt. The revolutionaries, who comprise large segments of Egyptian society including Islamic and secular groups, aspire to a new democratic Egypt, raising the slogans of freedom, dignity, and social justice. On the other hand those who benefited from the corruption of the Mubarak regime including influential politicians from the now-banned National Democratic Party (NDP), crooked businesspeople, and the beneficiaries of the security state, called in Egypt, the fulool or remnants of the former regime, long for the days when they ruled and ripped off the country with total impunity.
For most of last year, the fulool laid low waiting for a ripe opportunity for a comeback. They relied on the military council to ride the revolutionary spirit until the public became exhausted with a weary process that addressed little of their daily struggles. Meanwhile, the military allowed basically free and fair parliamentary elections, resulting in the Islamic parties gaining about 75 percent of the seats. But despite the decisive outcome, the military refused to change the government that comprised Mubarak-era ministers, while the state media relentlessly attacked the new parliament as being ineffective in solving people’s daily hardships. In fact, the economic situation became much worse in recent months as basic goods became scarce including bread and cooking oil, while gas prices hit the roof. Furthermore, security became a major problem as crime rates in Egypt jumped significantly higher than any time in modern Egyptian history.
Enter Gen. Shafiq. In February, Mubarak’s Prime Minister announced his candidacy as the person to restore security within 24 hours and return the Egyptian economy to stability and growth. Although denied by SCAF’s spokesman, he then claimed that he sought and received the backing of the military for his candidacy. Shafiq has vocally said that Mubarak was his role model and openly regretted the success of the revolution.
He flagrantly tried to exploit the rift between the Islamists and the secularists vowing to fight the religious groups. He also sent plain signals to the Christian minority in Egypt by warning against the emergence of a “religious state.” In an unmistakable message sent to the U.S. and Israel, Gen. Shafiq said that he wanted Cairo, not Palestine, to be the capital of Egypt, an implicit attack on his opponents, who publicly declared their support for the Palestinians in their struggle against Israeli occupation. In short, through Shafiq’s candidacy the fulool found their man and consequently hundreds of former NDP politicians, corrupt businesspeople, and former security chiefs joined his campaign.
Those include his campaign manager, Gen. Mahmud Wagdy, who served as Mubarak’s last interior minster under whose direction the infamous Battle of the Camel was waged on Feb. 2, 2011 by the armed goons in an effort to dislodge the revolutionary youth from Tahrir Square. Dozens of people were killed that day, while thousands were injured as a result of the vicious attacks. In addition, Shafiq’s campaign directors in every major province are former security chiefs aided by former NDP officials in those regions.
During the Mubarak era, it was the task of the security chief in each province to secure the support and loyalty of the local mayors and officials to the regime. Meanwhile the businesspeople linked to the Mubarak system of state cronyism were happy to finance his campaign (and their comeback) by spending tens of millions of pounds. Since the first round of the elections, when Shafiq came in second at 24 percent (within one percent of Muslim Brotherhood candidate, Dr. Muhammad Mursi), much evidence has surfaced about the funding of his campaign. For instance, one Shafiq bankroller turned out to be the wife of convicted billionaire and corrupt politician and businessman, Ahmad Ezz, the mastermind of the 2010 elections fraud and Gamal Mubarak’s scheme to succeed his father.
Egyptians, Arabs, and indeed the world waited for the fateful day on June 2 for the announcement of the judgment on Mubarak and his culprits. After a fifteen-minute rant by Judge Rifaat, in which he praised the revolution and condemned the former regime, he announced his appalling, but not so shocking, ruling. He sentenced Mubarak and his former interior minister Al-Adly to life sentences for the killing of the protesters. He then acquitted Mubarak, his sons, and Hussein Salem on the financial corruption charges because the statute of limitation had run out. He also acquitted the six security chiefs of all charges in regard to the killing of the protesters, citing a lack of evidence.
Western observers, including media outlets and human rights organizations such as Amnesty International, did not see the ruse and initially praised the ruling where for the first time in the history of the Arab World a head of state was tried, convicted, and sentenced to what is seemingly a harsh sentence (The trial of Saddam Hussein was not considered independent because it was conducted under American military occupation.).
But Egyptians were not fooled. They immediately condemned the political nature of the rulings and took to the streets across Egypt by the hundreds of thousands, in scenes reminiscent of the early days of the revolution. The consensus and unity generated by these sentences within all the strands of the revolutionary groups, as well as the families of the fallen and injured, may have been the result of SCAF’s and the fulool’s gross miscalculation that the revolutionary spirit had waned or that their comeback was imminent.
It should also be noted that in anticipation of Mubarak sons’ acquittals and the possibility of massive riots, the prosecutors indicted both sons last week on money laundering and insider trading on Egypt’s stock market. They were charged with illegally gaining as much as 2 billion pounds (about $330 million) over several years. Because of these charges Mubarak’s sons were not released after their acquittal this week. But Mubarak’s supporters still hope that when Shafiq wins the presidency in two weeks these charges would be dropped, as their dad would be pardoned.
But why are most Egyptians angry at the verdicts?
First, the political nature of the rulings cannot be overstated. Acquitting Mubarak and his sons on financial corruption should have been foreseen, as the prosecutors knew that the statute of limitation had run out. They had dozens of other criminal complaints on Mubarak and sons involving corrupt financial transactions and shady land deals worth billions of dollars over many years.
Secondly, the conviction of Mubarak and his interior minister was political because the judge declared in his ruling that he did not know how the protesters actually died since the forensic evidence was inconclusive. But in actual fact there are direct declarations from former interior ministry officials that most of the evidence was shredded and destroyed shortly after the ouster of Mubarak under the military council by the same security chiefs that were acquitted.
Many legal experts believe that by acquitting these security chiefs, who would have essentially carried out Mubarak’s orders, the conviction of their superiors would surely be ultimately overturned on appeal. In short, the judge may have sacrificed Mubarak momentarily as he saved his sons and the regime.
Moreover, during the past 16 months, not a single person, let alone any senior official, has been convicted of killing a single protester. All of the junior officers tried in Egypt during the past year have been acquitted. Even Mubarak and Al-Adly’s convictions are now susceptible to be overturned on appeal, since Mubarak himself did not kill the protesters. If his underlings are innocent then how could he have carried out the murders? And of course if Shafiq becomes president not only would he pardon the deposed dictator, but he would possibly restore to him the status of a former president.
Since February, the political process underway in Egypt has been carefully manipulated by SCAF and the fulool. The tactic hinged on dividing the revolutionary groups, and gradually restoring power to the former regime elements by convincing the majority of Egyptian voters that their security, economic stability, and future could not be trusted with such divided, inexperienced, and novice political parties. In addition, regional countries led by the Gulf states such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Kuwait, as well as foreign international powers including the U.S, Israel, and some European countries sent unmistakable signals to the Egyptian electorate that voting for Shafiq would bring stability, security, and economic prosperity, in an effort to reproduce the old regime with a democratic façade.
But instead of bringing most Egyptians closer to choosing Shafiq, the plot has backfired. As a consequence of the verdicts, the exhausted Egyptians have been reinvigorated and their unity reestablished, in a display unseen since February 11, 2011, the day Mubarak was ousted from power. In essence, the pronouncement of the trial’s outcome has sent a loud and unambiguous signal that all the gains of the revolution are now in jeopardy. Unless the revolutionary groups unite, convincingly win the second round of presidential elections to be held on June 16 and 17, and defeat Shafiq, the SCAF’s and fulool’s candidate, the Mubarak regime would indeed re-create itself and dash the hopes and aspirations of Egypt’s youth and pro-democracy groups.
Meanwhile, the MB’s candidate in the runoff, Dr. Mursi, announced that if he were elected president, he would form an independent investigative commission headed by a senior judge with impeccable credentials in order to gather evidence and retry Mubarak and his cronies. On the other hand, most Egyptian groups in support of the revolution see the imminent dangers that would result in a fulool comeback. They have announced their support for a presidential team to consist of the MB’s Mursi as president, and Dr. Abdelmoneim Abol Fotouh and Hamdein Sabahi, the runner-ups in the first round, as vice presidents. There have also been strong calls to have Dr. Mohammad Elbaradei, the former head of the UN Atomic Agency included in this team and serve as Prime Minister.
The three candidates representing different constituencies within the revolutionary groups (Mursi, Sabahi, and Abol Fotouh) received more than 15 million votes in the first round or about 65 percent of the total votes cast. It’s now up to the MB to rise to the challenge and unite all pro-revolution Egyptians. If such a presidential slate can be formed, it would be next to impossible for the fulool candidate to win. Only through such unity and a firm determination to overcome the petty differences -compared to what is at stake- can the Egyptians claim back their popular revolt. One of the most remarkable and peaceful revolutions in the history of the world.
Esam Al-Amin can be contacted at alamin1919@gmail.com
June 4, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Corruption, Solidarity and Activism | Ahmed Shafik, Egypt, Habib el-Adly, Hosni Mubarak, Hussein Salem, Mubarak |
Leave a comment
A new report says the Qatari intelligence chief was held by security forces at the Cairo Airport while carrying bags of cash a few days before the first round of Egypt’s presidential election.
The incident occurred on Saturday night when the Qatari ambassador to Cairo, who had appeared at the airport to receive a guest, attempted to get large baggage passed through without allowing inspection on it, citing the exigencies of a “diplomatic mission.”
The security forces at the Cairo Airport, though, insisted that the baggage be inspected since the matter had not been coordinated with the Egyptian Foreign Ministry.
When the bags were inspected, millions of dollars were found in them. Upon the disclosure, the Qatari ambassador had to disclose the identity of his guest, which had until then not been provided to the security forces.
The individual was identified as the Qatari intelligence chief, Ahmed Zaif, who had personally delivered the cash.
The incident is now widely believed to be an attempt on the part of Qatar to interfere in Egypt’s presidential election. The large number of votes announced to have been cast in favor of presidential hopeful Ahmad Shafiq implicate that huge campaign expenses, mostly allocated by Saudi Arabia and Egypt, have been spent to secure Shafiq’s victory in the election.
Mustafa al-Qanimi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood party, said in an interview recently that the election results have left no doubt that a huge sum of money has been spent in the course of the election with the aim of securing Shafiq’s victory.
Thousands of people took to the streets of the capital, Cairo, after the electoral commission confirmed that the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Mursi and former Egyptian Premier Ahmed Shafiq will face off in the country’s presidential runoff next month.
Revolutionaries in more than ten cities and governorates took to the streets, protesting the result and demanding Shafiq’s exclusion from the election. They also demanded the application of his political isolation, as the ex-premier was a prominent figure of the country’s deposed ruler, Hosni Mubarak.
May 30, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Corruption | Ahmed Shafik, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Shafiq |
Leave a comment
AMMAN, GAZA — European activists have condemned the Egyptian rejection to implement the obtained regulatory approvals in order to reach the Gaza Strip through the Sinai Peninsula.
The General Coordinator of the convoy “right of return”, Kevin Aovindan, stated, in a press conference held in trade unions headquarters in Amman yesterday, that the lack of clarity and the contrast in Egyptian officials’ positions prevented the arrival of the convoy to Gaza through the Egyptian borders.
Aovindan said that the President of the convoy, the British MP George Galloway was in Cairo until May 15, and he left after he had got the Egyptian official approval for the passage of the convoy to the Gaza Strip through Rafah crossing, however Egypt reneged on its approvals.
He added that “the participants in the convoy have spent over 3 weeks in Aqaba to get from the Egyptian authorities the permission to cross into Egypt and then to enter Gaza.
Aovindan said, regarding the aid collected by the convoy, “it will be sent to Gaza through the Jordanian Hashemite Charity Organization in coordination with the Jordanian Professional Associations”.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian government in Gaza has received new commitments from its Egyptian counterpart to allow Qatari fuel to enter the besieged Gaza Strip during the next few days, after contacts between the Palestinian, Qatari, and Egyptian authorities.
The Palestinian foreign minister, Mahmoud Awad, said there are new Egyptian promises to facilitate the passage of Qatari fuel to the only power station in the Gaza Strip, according to Al-Arab newspaper.
The need for the Qatari fuel is increasing these days to operate the power station in Gaza and to alleviate the crisis in the electrical sector for more than four months.
Awad said that the Egyptian government had told them that the full procedures required to start pumping fuel into Gaza are completed, hoping that it will reach Gaza the next few days.
“In the last communications with various parties, we were told that the shipment will arrive in the coming few days,” Awad said, adding that there is no logical reason for the delay.
He called on the Egyptian authorities to press on the occupation to increase the quantity of fuel which will enter daily to Gaza in order not to drag the transport process to operate the power station to relieve the suffering of the Palestinian citizens in Gaza.
The Palestinian foreign minister pointed out that Qatar has borne the full cost of storing and transporting fuel to the Gaza Strip, thanking the Qatari government and the Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani for their support for the Gaza strip and their role in transporting the fuel to Gaza.
Awad has praised the Qatari role in solving crisis in Gaza, stressing that the Palestinian people, who defend the dignity of the ummah, will never forget the Qatari position that was always behind them.
May 30, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Corruption, Illegal Occupation, Subjugation - Torture | Egypt, Gaza, Qatar |
Leave a comment
The official results of the first round of the historic Egyptian presidential elections, the first ever in Mother Egypt where the results were not known in advance, present an encouraging snapshot of ‘new democratic Egypt’ given that the choice of close to 50 per cent of Egypt’s approximately 50 million eligible voters, some standing in line to vote in scorching heat for hours, will not be officially announced until late May.
It appears, based on exit polls and information from the Muslim Brotherhood media office, that the two candidates who will face each other in the June 16-17 final round of voting will be the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Mursi (25 per cent) facing Mubarak-era Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq (24 per cent).
Mr Mursi and Mr Shafiq represent very different strands of Egyptian society. Mr. Shafiq will continue to draw his support from people fearful of an Islamist takeover, and those exhausted by the upheavals of the past 16 months.
Both finalists will carry substantial political baggage into Round Two. While Mursi will have the vast and competent Muslim Brotherhood organization working during the next two weeks to get out the vote for him, as well as the support of most Islamist parties, his candidacy still faces pervasive voter doubt over having the long outlawed MB control both Egypt’s Parliament and its Presidency. Egyptian voters appear to be worrying that this kind of broad power effectively is too similar to the Mubarak era and also eliminates checks and balances needed to moderate MB’s pledge to enact Sharia law and to honor its commitment to scrap military rule.
The following statement by the MB’s Mohammad Mursi, delivered just last week at a Cairo University campaign rally is raising concern:
“The Quran in our Constitution, the Prophet is our leader, jihad is our path, and martyrdom in the service of God is our goal. We shall enforce Islamic Sharia, and shall accept no alternative to it.”
Israel and the US will back Mr. Shafiq in various ways and he will benefit from the view that he represents Egypt’s military, many of the country’s wealthy and powerful more conservative voting blocks, the business community, Coptic Christians, (roughly ten per cent of the voters) who understandably seek security above all else, and many others who will vote for what they calculate to be the lesser of two evils.
Yet barring surprises, such as ex-President Hosni Mubarak being found innocent of all charges on June 2 when the verdict is to be announced in his case, which many lawyers are predicting is exactly what will happen, Mohammad Mursi will very likely prevail in the mid-June run-off and become Egypt’s first democratically elected President.
Many Middle East analysts, including American University of Beirut political sociology professor Sari Hanafi, believe this result will be good for the more than five million Palestinian refugees in the diaspora, those still under Zionist occupation in their own country, and welcomed by all who advocate the Palestinians’ full Return to their still occupied country.
The Prime Minister of the Palestinian government in Gaza, Ismail Haniyeh, declared on Thursday that “The Egyptian presidential election results will have a very positive affect on the course and future of the Palestinian cause as well as the role and place of the Muslim people in the world.”
Haniyeh knows that the Muslim Brotherhood, from which Hamas evolved, is highly sophisticated politically and while it tries to avoid attracting condemnation, or worse, from Washington and Tel Aviv, the MB intentions regarding Camp David, giveaway gas and other deals with Israel, and even diplomatic relations with the occupiers of Palestine are clear. A majority of Egyptians believe all will eventually be discarded as will the single remaining 19th century colonial enterprise itself.
Hamas officials have also acknowledged that they are looking more to Egypt and the Brotherhood for support as they move away from Syria and a top Hamas official, Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook, settled in Cairo after fleeing the unrest in Syria and maintains close ties with the Brotherhood.
Mursi has a long history of criticism of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. He has referred to Israel’s Foreign Minister Lieberman as a “vampire” and the settler movement as “Draculas.” Mr. Morsi has also criticized the Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas for what he called gullible collaboration with Israel for believing they would voluntarily accept a Palestinian state, and he has praised Hamas for resisting the Israeli occupation.
Brotherhood leaders have said they intend to use their influence with both Fatah and Hamas to urge them to compromise with each other to press Israel to recognize a Palestinian state. “The Brotherhood will gently pressure Hamas to be more pragmatic, although that is a direction that Hamas is already moving,” according to Shadi Hamid of the Brookings Doha Center.
Speaking with MB representatives in Cairo and Beirut over the past several months, the party’s position expressed to this observer is that the common thread that stitches together all the continuing regional uprisings can be described as a fundamental quest for dignity and the casting off of humiliation either from western imposed despotic regimes or from their illegitimate and aggressive agent, Israel.
Even before the completion of Egypt’s first democratic elections, which long-time election monitor Jimmy Carter has just labeled “very encouraging “there is broad recognition in Egypt that basic dignity demands the return of Palestine and its holy places, not just to the 1.5 billion Muslims and nearly as many Christians worldwide, but to all people of good will.
While no official MB decisions have been published regarding relations with Gaza and occupied Palestine, signs are everywhere from non-enforcement of Mubarak-Israeli-American pressures on Rafa, Gaza, travel and trade prohibitions that full normalization of relations between Egyptians and Palestinians under occupation is imminent.
And Israel and its American lobby know it and are preparing.
On Capitol Hill, and among the more than 60 intensively active and well-funded pro-Zionist organizations in the US, a campaign has already begun to neuter the Egyptian voter’s choice next month as surely as was achieved during the three decades of Mubarak rule.
A couple of examples.
AIPAC has launched a campaign to have the Obama administration, during the run-up to the coming election, now barely six months away, demand three things from the Mursi government:
“that the Mother Brotherhood scrap key elements of its political program and disassociate itself for ‘Islamism’; that it publicly pledge to fight ‘terrorism’ i.e. the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance, and that the MB pledge in writing to fully abide by the Camp David accords.”
Washington, according to Israel must insist that Egypt not only maintain its peace treaty with Israel, but Obama must tell the Brotherhood that any referendum on the Camp David Accords will be interpreted by the US as an attempt to destroy that agreement.
According to Israeli government water carrier Dennis Ross, “In recent conversations, Brotherhood leaders have expressed their belief that they would not be blamed if the treaty were revoked by a nationwide vote, as seems likely. They need to be told otherwise.”
When measured against what the MB stands for and has struggled for since its founding in 1928 by the Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna as well as the growing demands of the Egyptian public coupled with regional pleas for Egypt’s new government to restore Arab and Muslim dignity, these Israeli-US demands are patently absurd.
Ever in the service of Israel, Elliot Abrams, writing in the Zionist Islamophobic Weekly Standard, is proposing an approach that appears as fanciful and misguided as his WMD 2002-3 schemes to get the US to attack Iraq on behalf of Israel or his continuing five year campaign to get the US to bomb Iran for Israel.
Abrams is arguing recently, apparently seriously, that since the MB will be Egypt’s new government, Israel can still prevail if his advice is followed. Obviously unhappy with the prospect of the Muslim Brotherhood governing Egypt, Abrams does what he is paid to do for Israel, i.e. he metaphorically paints Pigs hoping they will look like Princesses.
Eliot is publicly blaming the US for not “standing by the Mubarak regime like the Russians are with Syria’s.” He declared “Had Mubarak and the Army played their cards better; Shafik might have been Mubarak’s successor without the harmful uprising that Egypt has experienced. Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel with all its blessings would be secure. Now, unless Shafik wins, Camp David is finished but we [Israel?] still have some excellent options.”
Abrams and elements of the Zionist lobby are telling Congress that “Israel must support Egypt’s “liberals” meaning, people who believe in democracy, liberty, and the rule of law rather than Islam as the guiding principles of Egypt and that the predicate must be that the electorate believes the MB had a clear chance and failed them.” He continued,“ If Shafik were to win many Egyptians will believe the elections were stolen by the Army and the old regime’s machine, and in any event power will be divided between the MB on one side and the Army and president on the other. There will be no clear lesson to learn when conditions in the country then continue to deteriorate given that the previous annual 6.5 billion foreign infusion into Egypt’s economy has reversed to a current annual $500,00 outflow with foreign investors fleeing and tourism in down 40 per cent from when Mubarak was in charge.”
Interestingly, Abrams and other spokesmen for AIPAC and the Zionist lobby are arguing that Mubarak’s most recent Prime Minister, Ahmed Shafiq’s victory next month is not necessarily something Israel and the West should favor or work to arrange. Given that the MB is the leading party in parliament and with the Salafists having an Islamist majority there, Abrams claims that this is actually good for Israel since its lobby will organize Congress to push the idea that MB control of both parliament and the presidency is dangerous and, “we can hold them and all Islamists in Egypt absolutely responsible for what happens to Egypt with its myriad problems and thus 100 percent of the responsibility for Egypt’s fate will drop on the MB.”
Abrams continues, “If the MB’s Mursi wins and he will, the MB will be in charge–and be forced to deliver. And when they fail, as they will given Israel’s key friends in the international business community, it will be absolutely clear who was to blame and this is good for Israel. What is in Israel’s interest is to support Egypt’s military which it has worked closely with for years and encourage the army to fight with all its tools for its interests”.
Abrams summarizes his thesis in an AIPAC email to donors: “So as far as Israel is concerned, a Mursi victory should not be mourned; given the situation in Egypt, in this election we can assure that the loser will pity the winner. Two cheers for Mursi! Now let’s get to work.”
May 29, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | Camp David Accords, Egypt, Hamas, Israel, Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook, Muslim Brotherhood, Sharia |
Leave a comment
In a piece titled “A Toxic Brew in Sinai,” JINSA fellow Evelyn Gordon notes “how badly the security situation in Sinai has deteriorated” in a post-Arab Spring Egypt, and concludes:
With Syria in flames and the Iranian nuclear crisis rapidly approaching climax, the last thing the world needs is an Israeli-Egyptian war. But absent intensive international engagement, the Sinai tinderbox is liable to spark one.
An Israeli-Egyptian war may be the last thing the world — especially, an already troubled Egypt — needs, but it may be exactly what some Greater Israel advocates have long wanted. As Israeli strategist Oded Yinon argued back in 1982:
(Regaining) the Sinai peninsula with its present and potential resources is therefore a political priority which is obstructed by the Camp David and the peace agreements. […] and we will have to act in order to return the situation to the status quo which existed in Sinai prior to Sadat’s visit and the mistaken peace agreement signed with him in March 1979.
Yinon did not consider that this would prove too difficult to achieve:
Israel will not unilaterally break the treaty, neither today, nor in 1982, unless it is very hard pressed economically and politically and Egypt provides Israel with the excuse to take the Sinai back into our hands for the fourth time in our short history. What is left therefore, is the indirect option. The economic situation in Egypt, the nature of the regime and its pan-Arab policy, will bring about a situation after April 1982 in which Israel will be forced to act directly or indirectly in order to regain control over Sinai as a strategic, economic and energy reserve for the long run. Egypt does not constitute a military strategic problem due to its internal conflicts and it could be driven back to the post 1967 war situation in no more than one day.
Presumably today’s Israeli war-planners would be equally as confident of success.
May 28, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Camp David, Egypt, Israel, Sinai, Sinai Peninsula |
Leave a comment
The provision of under-priced natural gas to Israel under the Mubarak government has long been fuel for public anger, but critics predict that the current powers will not be willing to permanently sever the old deals.
Cairo – The Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation’s decision to halt natural gas supplies to Israel – not in order to end the squandering of public funds, but due to overdue Israeli payments – has failed to impress campaigners who have long demanded the scrapping of the deal under which Israel has imported 1.7 million cubic meters of Egyptian gas annually since 2008.
The arrangement, which provides Israel with 40 percent of its gas needs, has been a subject of public anger for the past five years. Over that time, experts estimate that Egypt sustained losses amounting to Egyptian pounds (LE) 28 million (US$4.6 million) per day, as a result of exporting gas to a number of states such as Turkey, Spain, Jordan, and Israel at a price of US$0.705 per million British Thermal Units (MMBtu) at a time when world prices were fluctuating between US$2 and US$6 per MMBtu. The gas is exported through a 100 kilometer-long pipeline from Sinai to Asqalan on the Mediterranean coast.
The gas was supplied under the terms of an agreement signed by the Egyptian government and Israel in 2005, brokered by businessman Hussein Salem, a friend of deposed former President Hosni Mubarak. It guarantees nearly 2 billion cubic meters of Egyptian gas being exported annually to Israel for a 20-year period from the Eastern Mediterranean Gas (EMG) Company – a partnership involving Salem, the Israeli Merhav group, the Ampal American Israel Corporation, the Thai firm PTT, and American businessman Sam Zell – at a price below half the cost of extracting and transporting it.
Despite objections raised by some Egyptian MPs at the time, the agreement was rubber stamped by parliament, thanks both to the dominance of the then-ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) and the fact that a presidential confidant was involved (Mubarak’s sons Gamal and Alaa were also rumored to have been paid commissions by Salem for facilitating the deal). EMG was also granted a three-year tax exemption from 2005 to 2008 by the government.
Public opposition to the deal persisted, however. Political groups held demonstrations against it, legal challenges were mounted in the courts, and campaigning organizations were set up to stop it. But the regime was undeterred, even when geologists joined political activists in opposing the agreement, warning that Egypt’s gas reserves were being depleted to dangerously low levels. Jurists, too, opined that the agreement encroached on Egypt’s sovereignty and control over an important national resource.
A later bid by the Egyptian government to improve the terms of the deal was snubbed by the Israelis, according to Judge Adel Ferghalli, former head of the Administrative Courts division. He told Al-Akhbar that in 2008, the government referred seven agreements related to the export of gas to Israel to the Council of State’s legislation department, the judicial authority which reviews agreements and bills before they are put to parliament. The government requested that the accords be reviewed with a view to raising the export price from US$.705 to US$3.65 per MMBtu. This was duly done, but the Israeli side refused to agree to the higher price and insisted that the Israeli importing companies were bound by the 2005 agreement which set prices from US$.705 to a maximum of US$1.75.
This did not prevent Mubarak’s government from concluding further agreements with Israel in late 2010 to increase the quantity of gas supplied from 1.7 to 2.9 billion cubic meters, for a 20-year period starting in 2010 and at the old prices. This was claimed by a number of Israeli companies about two months before Mubarak was ousted from office, and not denied by the Egyptian government at the time.
With the outbreak of the January 2011 revolution and the assumption of power by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), demands for an end to gas sales to Israel became more vociferous. In response, former prime minister Essam Sharaf indicated shortly after he was appointed in early April last year that while Egypt could not breach contractual obligations to export gas to Israel it could review the terms, and promised to do that so as to raise Egypt’s yearly revenues from its gas deals by US$4 billion.
But time went by and nothing was done. So Egyptians took things into their own hands, as Ibrahim Yousri, a former ambassador and coordinator of the pressure group No Gas Sales to the Zionist Entity, put it. “They started relying on themselves to express their rejection of the squandering of public funds and the export of Egyptian gas at below world prices to a number of countries, especially Israel, which they consider their enemy,” he said. The pipeline supplying the gas to Israel has been bombed on 13 occasions in the year since Mubarak was ousted.
Yousri was dismissive of the decision to halt exports, suspecting it will prove temporary.
“If the military had wanted to salvage their reputation and avoid the accusation of squandering national resources, the agreement would have been scrapped completely,” he remarked.
He said the reason exports were halted was that the Israeli company importing the gas had withheld Egypt’s dues since 2010. Otherwise, SCAF had been doing exactly what Mubarak had done since 2008, effectively donating some US$10 million dollars daily to the Israeli treasury – the value of the gas supplied by Egypt. “That is not going to make them cancel the agreement outright, but just temporarily halt exports,” he said.
~
SCAF’s Image Vis a Vis Israel
By Bisan Kassab
Cairo – The decision to halt Egyptian gas exports to Israel cannot be seen in isolation from the impending end of the transitional period in Egypt, or the apparent falling out between the Muslim Brotherhood and the SCAF.
The ruling generals are badly in need of an “image boost,” according to Hassan Nafaa, professor of political science at Cairo University and a former member of the SCAF’s civilian advisory council.
While Cairo, represented by the head of the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) Muhamad Shuaib, officially attributed the move to the Israeli side’s failure to comply with its contractual obligations, the decision “is in essence political and not commercial,” Nafaa remarked.
He said the SCAF would certainly use the announcement, which was bound to receive wide public acclaim, to try to bolster its political standing. But he judged that any additional popularity it gained would be fleeting, and would not give it a political edge over its critics – especially in light of the recent legislation proposing the disqualification from politics of senior figures in the Mubarak regime, which has narrowed the SCAF’s room to maneuver.
He added that the dispute over late payments by the Israeli side provided the SCAF with a convenient means of acting without inviting undue pressure from the United States and Israel.
Nafaa’s skepticism seems well placed.
Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Fayza Abul-Naga – the Mubarak-era holdover who spearheaded the recent campaign against NGOs that receive foreign funding – has said that EGAS informed the Israelis that “the Egyptian side had no objections to reaching a new contract with new conditions and a new price.”
She stressed that the decision to halt exports was not taken suddenly, but after Israel had been notified five times that it was not meeting its financial obligations under the old contract, adding that the last deadline it was given for making its overdue payments was March 31.
Husam Issa, a professor of international law and member of a group seeking to recover public funds embezzled during the Mubarak years, remarked that the Israelis had no grounds for objecting. Non-payment was clearly a sufficient reason for terminating a contract without being accused of acting out of political motives or under public pressure, he said.
April 25, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Economics, Timeless or most popular | Ampal American Israel Corporation, EGAS, Egypt, Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation, Hosni Mubarak, Israel |
Leave a comment
Egypt has denied permission to eight US-based nonprofit groups to open offices and operate in the North African country.
An official of Egypt’s Insurance and Social Affairs Ministry said the ministry rejected the applications because the groups’ activities “breach the country’s sovereignty,” Egyptian state news agency MENA reported on Monday.
The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the Carter Center for Human Rights, the Coptic Orphans, Seeds of Peace, and various other groups had been denied permission to work in Egypt.
He also said that if any of the groups try to operate without permits, they will be punished in accordance with Egyptian law.
Last month, anger against the United States rose in Egypt after foreign non-governmental organization (NGO) workers left the country before standing for their trials.
A total of 43 foreign and Egyptian activists, including the son of the US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, were accused of receiving illegal funds and running unlicensed NGOs in Egypt.
A group of 15 NGO workers, including Americans, departed Cairo in a US government plane on March 1. The departure came despite the travel ban imposed on the accused.
Earlier, US authorities had threatened to cut a USD 1.5-billion annual aid package to Egypt if the issue was not resolved.
Many Egyptians suspect that the US is instigating unrest in the country, by the funding of certain civil society groups in Egypt.
April 23, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Corruption, Deception | Carter Center, Coptic Orphans, Egypt, Non-governmental organization, Seeds of Peace, United States |
Leave a comment
The head of the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company said Sunday it has terminated its contract to ship gas to Israel because of violations of contractual obligations, a decision Israel said overshadows the peace agreement between the two countries.
Ampal-American Israel Corporation, a partner in the East Mediterranean Gas Company (EMG), which operates the pipeline, said it had notified Egypt it was “terminating the gas and purchase agreement”.
The company said in a statement that the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation and Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) had notified them of the decision, adding that “EMG considers the termination attempt unlawful and in bad faith, and consequently demanded its withdrawal”.
Mohamed Shoeib, chairman of EGAS, told Al-Masry Al-Youm that EGAS is using its right to terminate the contract due to EMG’s breach of the gas supply agreement. He added that the decision was made after a thorough legal review by local and international legal experts.
A source within the petroleum ministry told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the dispute is purely commercial and has no other connotations.
The 2005 natural gas deal has become a symbol of tensions between Israel and Egypt since the uprising. For many Egyptians, it typifies the close relations the regime of deposed President Hosni Mubarak forged with Israel, despite wide hostility toward the Jewish state among his people.
Critics charge that Israel got the gas for bargain prices and that Mubarak cronies skimmed millions of dollars off the proceeds.
Egyptian militants have blown up the gas pipeline to Israel 14 times since the uprising.
Israel insists it is paying a fair price for the gas.
Companies invested in the Israeli-Egyptian venture have taken a hit from numerous explosions of the cross-border pipeline and are seeking compensation from the Egyptian government of billions of dollars.
The pipeline was financed by the National Egyptian Bank.
Ampal and two other companies have sought $8 billion in damages from Egypt for not safeguarding their investment.
Shoeib told the Associated Press said Israel has not paid for its gas in four months. Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor denied that.
He told Egyptian TV the decision has been in place since Thursday.
The English website of the Israeli daily Haaretz on Sunday quoted sources close to EMG as saying “Egypt does not understand what it is doing. This move will bring back the country – politically and economically – by 30 years. This is a breach of the peace agreement with Israel.”
On Sunday, Israel Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz said the unilateral Egyptian announcement was of “great concern” politically and economically.
“This is a dangerous precedent that overshadows the peace agreements and the peaceful atmosphere between Israel and Egypt,” he said in a statement. Israel and Egypt signed a peace treaty in 1979, but relations have never been warm.
The Israeli side said the decision was “unlawful and in bad faith,” accusing the Egyptian side of failing to supply the gas quantities it is owed.
Israel insists it is paying a fair price for the gas. Israel’s electricity company has been warning of possible power shortages this summer, partly because of the unreliability of the natural gas supply from Egypt.
For the long term, Israel is developing its own natural gas fields off its Mediterranean coast and is expected to be self-sufficient in natural gas in a few years.
Hussein Salem, a close friend of Mubarak was among the shareholders of East Mediterranean, the joint Egyptian-Israeli company that carries the gas to Israel.
On the Israeli side, EMG sought international arbitration in October because of the Egyptian side’s failure to supply the quantity of gas stipulated in the contract — because of the frequent bombings.
Under the 2005 deal, the Cairo-based East Mediterranean Gas Co. sells 1.7 billion cubic meters of natural gas to the Israeli company at a price critics say is set at $1.50 per million British thermal units — a measure of energy.
The gas deal has been the subject of litigation in Egypt. An appellate court last year overturned a lower court ruling that would have halted gas exports to Israel. Opposition groups that filed the suit before the uprising claimed that Israel got the gas too cheaply under the 15-year fixed price deal between a private Egyptian company, partly owned by the government, and the state-run Israel Electric Corporation.
Ibrahim Yousri, a former Egyptian diplomat who had brought the issue to court, welcomed the decision announced Sunday.
“It has become a scandal bigger than the (ruling) military council can withstand,” he told the privately-owned channel CBC.
He said there are gas shortages in Egypt, and growing economic woes, further inflaming popular unrest. He called the business deal “treason” to national interests, adding, “This is a great political step.”
April 22, 2012
Posted by aletho |
Economics | Al-Masry Al-Youm, East Mediterranean Gas Company, EGAS, Egypt, Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation, Israel |
Leave a comment
Aletho News
Aletho News 