Excerpt... please read full article... link below! :) Al-Sisi also cautioned that two generations – i.e, nearly six decades – of sacrifice would be acceptable for the sake of the rest of the population. This rhetoric is reminiscent of Stalin, the cruelest tyrant despot in all of Russian history. But who has given el-Sisi a mandate to make decisions for Egypt and determine the countrys future for the next 60 years? Even if elected president, his term would not last more than eight years, and so he shouldnt make decisions that determine the countrys future in the long-term. That is, unless he intends to relive Mubaraks experience and that of his predecessor (both of whom came from military backgrounds) by removing the term limits set out in the constitution. Al-Sisi called upon the weak and the poor to ‘tighten their belts’ and embrace austerity measures in order to help their country, warning that higher prices are around the corner. Earlier, he had promised to lift subsidies all at once, announcing in a prior speech that everyone receiving basic commodities should pay the full price. It was a direct reference to his intention to eliminate all subsidies on essential commodities, which Egypts poor depend on. This, all while letting the wasteful government and wealthy Egyptians, including military leaders, strut about in blissful and sometimes ill-begotten luxury, never asking them to do something for their country. Thus, al-Sisis statements seem to indicate his opposition to social justice, even though it was foremost among the great popular revolutions demands. He has not asked anything of the rich, instead placing the burden entirely upon the downtrodden and vulnerable. Yet according to Forbes, some of the world’s richest are wealthy Egyptian families. Forbes revealed that just eight Egyptians possess 156 billion Egyptian pounds, 30 billion more than last year, when the economy was deteriorating and most Egyptians were harder hit than ever. Four-fifths of Egyptian families spend less than 2000 pounds per month. From Dr. Nader Ferganys op-ed The Field Marshall… and the Direction of the Revolution, al-Ahram, 24 March 2014 Link: In Translation: Nader Fergany on Sisinomics arabist.net/blog/2014/3/30/in-translation-nader-fergany-on-sisinomics
Posted on: Mon, 07 Apr 2014 00:50:08 +0000
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