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TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012

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Daily NEWSEGyPT

Abu Simbel feAtured in the doodle of the dAy

Google honours pharaonic landmark on day the inner temple is illuminated

el-eriAn didn’t reSign from Advi-Sory council

Former presidential candidate tweeted his resignation on 20 October

ActiviStS tASered by idf

Israel has denied the use of excessive force in detaining Gaza bound ship 32 8

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Issue No. 2057

by Joel gulhane and hassan ghoneim

Dubai Ports World (DPW), the com-pany that runs the port in Al-Sokhna which has been closed for over 10 days

due to striking workers, announced on Monday that the International Mari-time Organisation (IMO) is consider-ing blacklisting the port. The claims have been refuted by the IMO.

It was reported earlier in the day

that the commercial manager for DPW, Ayman Badawy announced the port was blacklisted, although he has since denied this. It is unclear what the source of this information is because the IMO has confirmed that it does not

have a blacklist of ports. DPW has also confirmed that it will not be negotiat-ing with the recently formed workers union.

Badawy claims that “they are just warn-ing us, it is not official.” When he was in-formed that the IMO does not have a blacklist for ports he said “this informa-tion was sent to me in a fax by the Red Sea Port Authority.” The Red Sea Port Au-thority was not available to comment on the situation. Badawy also blamed the me-dia for suggesting that he had announced that the port had been blacklisted.

The IMO website states, “IMO does not issue a ‘black list’ of any kind. There is no IMO list of ports or flag states which are not in compliance.” Badawy however maintained that he had re-ceived a warning saying, “this could be a fake report, I don’t know. It could be an attempt by the media to cause trouble.” He also claimed that “some people have misused the words I have said.”

Earlier on Monday Badawy also con-firmed that no meeting had been set up between the administration and the workers union which was formed last Wednesday. Badawy said that the ad-ministration in Sokhna had been told by the head office in Dubai to not negotiate with the workers unless they resumed their duties.

continued on page 3

by rana muhammad taha and basil el-dabh

Opposition to the draft constitution continues to grow a day before the ju-diciary is to decide the future of the Constituent Assembly.

The National Council for Women (NCW) and former presidential can-didate Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh’s Strong Egypt Party (SEP) both held press conferences voicing their griev-ances with the draft constitution on Monday. These groups were the latest of a series of voices expressing concern with what will be Egypt’s founding docu-ment.

The head of the NCW, Mervat Al-Tellawi, expressed the council’s disap-pointment with the draft constitution, listing various complaints.

The NCW had reservations regard-ing female representation in the Con-stituent Assembly, the lack of criteria for selecting the members of the assembly and the “loose” style of writing which makes the articles rather vague.

Regarding the contents of the draft, the NCW deplored the absence of a guarantee that international conven-tions are binding or that the state will enforce gender equality. They took issue with placing women’s rights in the context of Islamic Shari’a and making a religious institution like Al-Azhar party to the constitution. The council also criticised what they say as a lack of proper respect for the judiciary and the lack of reference to human trafficking.

Addressing gender equality, jour-nalist Amina Shafiq criticised Al-Nour party spokesperson Nader Bakkar for saying in a TV interview that full gen-der equality would require approving

female polygamy and equal inheritance rights. Shafiq contended that male po-lygamy is equally unacceptable, only to be shouted down by an audience member demanding to know why, if God allowed men to marry more than once, should she oppose it.

“Upon the formation of the Con-stituent Assembly, none of us were am-bitious about the constitution it would draft, due to the basis upon which it

was formed,” writer and feminist activ-ist Fatheya Al-Assal said, pointing out that of the 100 assembly members, only seven are women, five of them are from the Muslim Brotherhood and see female genital mutilation as a “protec-tion” for women.

Al-Assal argued that should the cur-rent Constituent Assembly be dissolved in Tuesday’s expected administrative court ruling, a new assembly should

be formed not by president Mohamed Morsy but by the entire population.

“The Constituent Assembly is void,” Kefaya movement cofounder George Ishaq said. “Thus we refuse this draft constitution which fails to properly rep-resent us. We need at least six months to discuss this constitution with the Egyptian people.”

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In Egypt music is a varied as it is trea-sured. From Quranic recitals that are sung across the city in mosques to the gritty and often telling tales found in rap, all forms of music are available to those who search for it. Perhaps one of the most unexpected and yet increasingly present forms of music in Egypt is the

metal genre, whose artists and fans find themselves living in parallel with a so-ciety that is largely ignorant and at the same time apprehensive of the fast riffs, aggressive drum style and often coarse tone of voice that the genre presents.

Feature on page 7

by connor molloy

Ahmed Shafiq’s supporters have sub-mitted documents to the prosecutor general challenging the results of this year’s presidential election. On Monday, a judge reportedly rejected a request from the prosecutor general for access to Shafiq’s financial records.

Karim Bayoum, a member of the ad-ministration office of the New Egyptian Movement Party, said, “Shawky El-Sayed [Shafiq’s lawyer] submitted documents regarding the results of the presiden-tial election results to the general prosecutor office.” The New Egyptian Movement is a recently created party of which Shafiq is both a founder and the most prominent member.

Bayoum would not disclose when or why the documents were submitted, but unconfirmed documents online show paperwork from the election committee with a vote tally that would have made Shafiq the winner.

A representative from the pros-ecutor general’s office confirmed that a complaint was filed on Monday on Shafiq’s behalf.

The prosecutor general was report-edly refused access to Shafiq’s financial records, according to a statement re-leased on Monday by the Freedom and Justice Party, whose candidate Moham-med Morsy beat Shafiq in the election.

However, this is not out of order, said Assem Soliman, chairman of the Egyp-tian Centre for Transparency and Anti-corruption. “According to central bank law number 88 for the year 2003, no institution can look at these accounts or financial records for anyone because of privacy issues, except if they have a court order.”

In the general prosecutor’s case, he lacks the prerequisite court order.

Three members from the prosecu-tor general’s office were contacted and said they could not give information on the case.

workers at el-Sokhna have brought the port to a standstill with strike action

Anarchy band members perform on stage

Ahmed Shafiq meeting supporters at Katamey in cairo before the presidential elections

woman protesting outside a national council for women press conference where they expressed disappointment with the draft constitution. the sign is an interpretation of a women’s council slogan calling for equality before the law

Draft constitution under attackWomen’s group and Abul Fotouh’s new party reject draft document

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a showcase of Egyptian heavy metal music

Shafiq goes to battle with prosecutor generalElections results and bank accounts at centre of lawsuits

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6.4773 6.7736 Mahmoud 'Sandmonkey' Salem writes:

With notable exceptions, the major-ity of Egyptian movies seem to be made with consistent mediocrity, while pretending to be artistic be-cause they seemingly reflect “Egyp-tian reality”; something I like to call the “Khaled Yusef” disease

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Egyptian Stock Exchange

Closing Daily Change

EGX 30 5,721.09 0.08%EGX 70 527.02 -0.05%

EGX 100 872.06 -0.19%EGX 20 6,682.43 0.05%

Commentary

Claims of Sokhna port being black listed are falseInternational Maritime Organisation denies existence of a black list

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www.thedailynewsegypt.com

2 Daily news egypt TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012

By Fady Salah

Tawfeq Okasha, controversial TV an-chor and founder of El Fara’een channel, said the Nile Sat administration refused to re-broadcast his channel, although he gained a court verdict permitting this.

According to El Fara’een’s media advisor Mohamed Moussa, Khaled So-liman, the channel’s legal advisor and Okasha’s lawyer, said he went to the headquarters of Nile Sat on Sunday, to inform its personnel of the ruling issued by administrative court on 20 October. Khaled added that Salah Hamza, chief executive officer of Nile Sat, alongside other Nile Sat personnel, refused to ex-ecute the ruling.

In contrast, a source inside Nile Sat explained that they will broadcast the channel when it pays its financial debts, which amount to EGP 4 million. The

source also added that the Nile Sat ad-ministration met with Okasha several times, to schedule the debts. However, the channel and its owner, Okasha, didn’t comply with the dates of payment and the debt accumulated.

Okasha responded, in a press confer-ence held on Monday in Ibn Khaldoun Center, saying he doesn’t have a money printing machine, explaining that the schedule was to pay his debts in Au-gust, September and October; when the channel had already been shut down.

He added that he is currently look-ing for another satellite to broadcast his channel, saying Nile Sat has violated freedom of opinion and expression.

“We will organise a sit-in in front of the Nile Sat headquarters on Wednesday, and we are calling every moral person to join us to acquire our rights and rebroadcast our channel.” concluded Okasha.

By Rana Muhammad Taha

Workers at the Dakahleya sugar com-pany held a demonstration on Monday afternoon in front of the Cairo press syndicate, protesting against the condi-tions of state-owned sugar companies.

As they prepared to march to the cabinet offices to issue their demands, the workers put their banners on dis-play, chanting against the restrictions im-posed on state-owned sugar companies which cost them money and jeopardise produce.

“Egypt has a 900,000-tonne deficiency in sugar,” Dakahleya sugar worker and protester Ahmed Sayeed Ragab said, “yet there are 700,000 tons of sugar stocked in state-owned companies waiting to be sold, 182,000 tons available in Dakahleya sugar company alone.”

Ragab said that every now and then it is reported in the news that the state is running out of sugar reserves, whereas the factories are full of sugar that won’t be sold.

“If there’s such a huge deficiency in our sugar reserve, then why does our locally-produced sugar remain unsold?” Ragab questioned.

“The problem arose following Essam Sharaf’s sugar deal,” another protester from Dakahleya sugar, Yehia Alam Al-Din, said.

Former Prime Minister Essam Sharaf enacted the European part-nership sugar deal, which removes any customs-expenses from the pro-cess of importing or exporting sugar from and to Europe, state-owned Al-Ahram reported.

“The deal flooded the Egyptian mar-ket with imported sugar,” Alam Al-Din said, “and thus left the locally-produced sugar unsold.”

Dakahleya Sugar Company has a target of producing 800,000 tons of sugar by February 2013, Alam Al-Din said. Should its current produce remain unsold till then, the company will be threatened with bankruptcy.

Citing a statement released by the

head of the Dakahleya sugar company workers’ union, Essam Al-Negreidy, Al-Ahram reported that the imported sugar reaches Egypt with a price tag of EGP 3,800, whereas locally-produced sugar costs almost EGP 3,900.

The workers demand that the gov-ernment finds a way to help them sell their produce or allow them to export it if there’s no need for it in the local mar-ket. They said that the private-owned sugar companies have a free-market agreement with the government which allows them to dispose of their produce profitably.

“We are pressured since we cannot dispose of our produce except through the government,” Ragab said, “that’s why we demand that they either grant us a free market agreement or stall sugar importation.”

Alam Al-Din stated that there are 1,250 workers in Dakahleya Sugar Company whose jobs are at stake as long as produce remains unsold. The company has financial obligations to-

wards the farmers who plant the beet used in producing sugar. It has already taken a bank loan worth of EGP 800 million (with an 11.5-per cent-interest rate) in order to pay the farmers.

“Our demands aren’t of a categori-cal nature,” Alam Al-Din said, stressing that sugar is a strategic product which needs to remain available in the Egyptian market.

Monday’s march was called for by the Dakahleya sugar company work-ers’ union, who released a statement on Sunday claiming that state-owned sugar companies are being subjected to a savage attack. Al-Negreidy accused the investors who have a monopoly on sugar of drowning the market with tons of imported sugar, which in turn led to inflation in the market of locally-produced sugar.

Al-Negreidy said in the statement that the union had presented their de-mands to the president, the prime min-ister and all officials concerned with the matter, but all to no avail.

By Hend Kortam

Anti-harassment campaigns are rallying their efforts to fight sexual harassment during the Eid holiday.

The Be a Man campaign, Egypt’s Girls are a Red Line, the Youth of the Country, the Red Crescent, Start with Yourself and Building Egypt Initiative, are a few of the campaigns that will be working on the streets to stop sexual harassment in a joint effort.

Shereen Badr, who founded the Be a Man campaign said they will start train-ing the volunteers for three days start-ing Monday. “Today the training will be held in the Red Crescent’s office and tomorrow, it will be in Cairo University,” Badr is hoping that around 100 will vol-unteer to help during Eid.

“They will be trained on how to deal with overbearing men and how to stop harassments before they happen,” she added. The campaigns will be active on the second and third days of the Eid holi-day, which starts on Friday, meaning the campaigns will be working on Saturday and Sunday next week.

Dina Farid the founder of Egypt’s Girls are a Red Line, said that the train-ing will focus on the reasons there is harassment in our society, how to solve the problem, the types of culprit, how to deal with them, the language that they can use and how to provide psychologi-cal assistance and help to the victim.

Farid said that the point of the event is, “to raise awareness about the issue and to stop harassment.” Many cam-paigns have been working together in the past few weeks to raise aware-ness on the issue and prepare for the events that they will be holding during

Eid. Downtown Cairo is particularly infamous for sexual harassment during Eid, which is why the As You Condemn, You will be Condemned campaign will be raising awareness there on the third and fourth days of Eid.

Another call to fight the phenome-non uses a different approach. An event on Facebook called, “A call to harass the harasser,” was created this week and is calling on men only to spray paint the shirts of offenders with the words, “I am a harasser.” The group will work in Downtown Cairo.

Badr was not aware of the Face-book group but was not too excited about the idea when she heard its name. She related how in one of the previous events on the street, “there were groups of men who would strip harassers and humiliate them. Our be-haviour isn’t violent, we try to prevent harassment and hand the culprit over to the police and get the girl to file a complaint,” she said.

Farid also said that she prefers that the volunteers treat people with dig-nity, even the harasser. She says that she

teaches the volunteers to be friendly because if they treat the people like they’re better than them, no one will listen to them. She added that if a more aggressive tone is used with harassers, things could turn violent and that it is better to distract them instead.

During their events, there’s usually no incidents of harassment, but, “one day on the street is not enough,” Farid said. The media has a very important role to play in magnifying the efforts of these campaigns so that in the long run, there will be an impact, she added.

el-erian didn’t resign from presidential advisory councilPresidential adviser going on a long vacation

locally-produced sugar overly abundant in the marketDakahleya sugar company workers march as their produce is threatened

anti-harassment campaigns gear up for eid As the Eid Al-Adha holiday looms, incidents of sexual harassment increase

By Fady Salah

Sources in the presidency have as-serted that Essam El-Erian, leading fig-ure in the Freedom and Justice Party, didn’t submit an official resignation from the presidential advisory council.

El-Erian had posted a tweet on 20 October saying he had resigned.

“I have asked that the president take the decision to relieve me of my duties on the advisory board and for the [FJP] party to elect a new deputy chairman and secretary general in continuation of our journey. God is with me and will guide me,” he tweeted on Saturday night.

Later on, media organisations re-ported that president Morsy had re-jected El-Erian’s resignation.

On Monday, El-Erian posted a new tweet saying he is leaving Cairo on a long vacation.

Later a source inside the presidencial office stated that El-Erian didn’t submit an official document of resignation.

Saad El-Katatni, newly elected presi-dent of the FJP, appointed El-Erian as vice president of the party after his internal election win on Friday. Katatni also del-egated the presidency of the party to El-Erian, as he headed to Mecca for Haj (pilgrimage).

El-Katatni tweeted that he insists on having El-Erian as the vice president of the party.

By Connor Molloy

Confusion over a missing boy and the discovery of a charred corpse led to fighting outside a hospital in the Nile Delta town of Belqas. Ibrahim Ahmed, 15, went missing on Friday afternoon, then on Saturday a burned body was found in a nearby cemetery. Ibrahim’s father went to the hospital and identified the body as that of his son.

An autopsy later established that the body was not Ibrahim’s. However, before the post mortem Ibrahim’s fa-ther rallied family and friends to march toward the Belqas General Hospital, in an attempt to retrieve the body.

Belqas police intercepted the crowd and clashes ensued.

“They started fighting with the police,” said Omar Magdy, a repre-sentative of the 6 April Movement in the region. “They thought that the policemen didn’t want to give them their son.”

During the street clashes, one of

Ibrahim’s uncles was shot in the eye with a rubber bullet and taken into the hospital.

As the fighting continued, Ibrahim’s father was informed by the hospital staff that the body could not be Ibra-him. Date of death was established at one week before it was found, whereas Ibrahim was most recently seen dur-ing this Friday’s prayers. A DNA test conclusively proved the body was not Ibrahim’s.

Major Ahmed Hader at the Ministry of Interior said the body was actu-ally from a “robbery of someone who was driving a tuk-tuk on Saturday [14 October], and he was killed by some criminals.”

The tensions in the street in Belqas only cooled when Ibrahim’s father an-nounced that the corpse was not his son after all.

Following the fighting there is still much left unresolved. Ibrahim has not been found, and now there is a body, which was discovered burned and dumped in a cemetery, whose identity is unknown.

A high profile casualty of the Cabinet Office protests reopened yesterday with new displays of historical books and documents, some severely charred by the fire that consumed the building last year. During fighting on Qasr Al-Eini Street in December 2011 a fire started that gutted the Scientific Institute causing the roof and floors to collapse. The research centre housed more than 200,000 rare books, including an original copy of Description de l’Egypte; written by French scientists during the Egyptian campaign from 1798 to 1801.Experts in antiquities were joined by volunteers who worked round the clock to save the books and preserve what was left of a unique collection. Despite extensive damage the Scientific Institute building was eventually restored as a study centre and library, although it stands custodian over a much reduced collection.

Family of missing boy clash with local policeUnidentified corpse found in Dakahliya

Rising from the flames

Tawfiq Okasha speaks to the media during a press conference

Essam El-Erian arrives at the FJP conference for the election of a new party leader

A member of the “Be a man” campaign talks on the streets of Cairo during a previous anti-sexual harassment event (File photo)

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Okasha calls for sit-in in front of nile sat premisesNile Sat refuses to re-broadcast El-Fara’een channel

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By Luiz Sanchez

Several crew members of the latest ship attempting to breach the Gaza naval blockade, have accused the Is-raeli security forces of attacking them with tasers as their ship was boarded in international waters. Israel has ve-hemently denied the use of excessive force during the take-over. The Estelle is a Swedish-based ship crewed by 30 people, including five European par-liamentarians and a former Canadian parliamentarian.

The ship was 30 miles off the coast of Gaza, when Israel’s navy intercepted the vessel; its crew is being accused of attempting to illegally enter Israel. Nine members of the crew from Greece, Italy and Spain signed a confes-sion of illegal entrance given to them by Israeli authorities and have been released. “Our lawyer is working on a new statement which would say the crew was taken to Israel against their will and if the authorities would agree on such a text then most [of the re-maining] members would likely sign it,” the Ship to Gaza’s media co-ordinator Mikael Löfgren said.

No humanitarian supplies were found, save some wheelchairs, accord-ing to the Israeli army spokesperson Avital Liebovich. “All the talk about humanitarian aid is a lie and a provoca-tion,” she told AFP.

Löfgren called Liebovich’s comments outright propaganda by the Israeli gov-ernment. “There are thousands, if not tens of thousands of people that have seen what we have in our cargo and we also have photographs of the cargo,” he said.

Dror Feiler, one of the spokesper-sons of Ship to Gaza, was onboard the ship and is currently being held sepa-rately from the others. Feiler is a Swed-ish citizen born in Israel and is being held as an Israeli citizen. The organisa-tion and Feiler himself maintain that he forewent his citizenship years ago in protest against Israel’s policy towards Palestinians. “As far as we and Feiler are aware, his citizenship was revoked years and years ago,” Löfgren stated. He also said most of their members were prepared to stay in Israel until Feiler is able to leave with them, out of fear of what would happen to him if they left.

The palmer report, published by a United Nations panel of enquiry fol-lowing the 2010 flotilla massacre, is one of Israel’s main justifications for continuing the blockade. “It is not a legal document,” Löfgren said, “but a diplomatic effort from the UN to try and solve the diplomatic crisis be-tween Turkey and Israel that followed the 2010 flotilla massacre.” Nine ac-tivists, mostly from Turkey, onboard a flotilla were killed by Israeli security forces boarding the ships. The report concluded Israel had legal grounds for the blockade but criticised their methods.

The Swedish foreign ministry released a statement on Saturday which declared Ship to Gaza’s goals and Sweden’s policies are very much the same, but they could not endorse the ship's activities due to the dan-ger the members would be putting themselves in.

Ship to Gaza also had their website attacked on Saturday as events at sea were developing. The attack brought down the website for several hours and their web experts have concluded the attack was planned.

By Fady Salah

Syrian opposition figures discussed on Sunday the future of Syria after the pre-dicted departure of Bashar Al-Assad at the Arab Forum for Alternatives in Cairo.

Fifty-five Syrian political activists and researchers representing all aspects of the Syrian opposition spectrum gath-ered in Cairo to announce a report titled “supporting a democratic tran-sition of power in Syria.” The report is produced by The Day After project, which aims to find solutions to the challenges faced in a Syrian transition and to prevent further bloodshed in Syria.

Naguib Ghadban, Syrian opposition figure and a member of the executive committee of The Day After project, said the idea for the project came from following the Arab Spring revo-lution, in which the Arab leaders tried to maintain their power by claiming there were no other alternatives to their rule.

“We decided to counter this ste-reotype by founding this report, which was conducted by figures represent-ing all the religious, ethnic and ideo-logical groups in Syria. Our report seeks to create a new social contract between the new Syrian nation and its citizens, where the importance of equality and rule of law shall persist,” said Ghadban.

Ghadban said the report focuses on the notion of transitional justice, which grants the different Syrian groups equal rights.

He added the Syrian revolution is not a sectarian one, asserting that Shi’as, Sun-nis, Christians and Kurds participated in the revolution against the tyrant Bashar Al-Assad. He added Syria won’t be di-

vided into different independent states. He added that Syrian Kurds might have local autonomy, due to their cultural and linguistic differences.

Ghadban mentioned that the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood is a national group, which has participated in the struggle of the Syrian people. He added that the Muslim Brotherhood accepted the charter of the Syrian National Council stating that Syria is a civil state.

Afraa Galaby, Syrian activist and a member of the executive committee of The Day After project, asserted the importance of the rule of law in the transition from dictatorship to-wards democracy. She added the rule

of law in Syria depends on protect-ing the infrastructure and informa-tion databases. She said the Syrian regime is trying to destroy every-thing before they resign from power, including databases of Syrian citizens’ information.

Afraa also mentioned that there are currently more than 20,000 political detainees in Syria, predominantly youth, including children.

Afraa asserted that Turkey is a democratic country helping the Syr-ian opposition morally. She denied the possibility of further Turkish interven-tion in Syria after the departure of Al-Assad.

By Joel Gulhane

Ten human rights organisations and the lawyer of Alber Saber, the blogger on trial for contempt of religion, filed a complaint with the prosecutor general on Monday, over the ill treatment he has faced while in police custody.

The decision to file the complaint was announced through a statement published on the website of the Asso-ciation for Freedom of Thought and Ex-pression. The complaint concerns the conditions Saber is subjected to in Tora prison, the treatment by police when he was transferred to the court for trial, and the lack of security provided for him during his transfer.

Ahmed Ezzat, Saber’s lawyer said “he faces very bad conditions in pris-

on. He has a very bad room with no light, no water and a bad smell due to the lack of ventilation.” Ezzat also said that Saber has been denied medical care by the prison administrator, “the handcuffs cut his wrists because the police mistreated him when he was in court and he was denied medical care. He has not slept for three days because he is tense about the trial. He requested to see a doctor again but was refused.”

Ezzat highlighted “All of the letters he writes to his family and the letters they write to him are taken too. Books which are sent to him are taken as well.” He also said “He has to stay in his room twenty-four hours a day and is not al-lowed to leave unless he is going to court, not even for exercise. He asked

to be allowed out for a few minutes but was refused.”

The statement said not enough pro-tection is provided for Saber when he goes to court. He was attacked by some men the last time he was transferred to court. It also stated, “the food pro-vided by the prison is unfit for human consumption.”

Ezzat said “the actions of the prison are arbitrary; the law gives all prison-ers rights including food, water, medical care and a room with a light.”

According to the statement the at-torney general has passed the complaint on to the south of Cairo prosecution in order to investigate the claims.

Saber’s trial was adjourned on 17 October and is set to continue on 14 November.

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Ishaq’s speech was interrupted by a heckler who questioned the value of the discussions given that slum-dwell-ers like himself were currently reduced to eating rubbish.

At their press conference, the SEP re-leased a 31-page report outlining their issues with many of the articles of the draft, ranging from ones outlining presi-dential powers to those that address human rights and personal freedoms.

The document quotes many ar-ticles of the draft and provides the SEP’s position on each of them. The party asserted that Egypt’s next con-stitution should represent “the revo-lution and its goals.” The report lists social and economic rights, the rights of workers, the welfare of Egyptian farmers, the restriction of presiden-tial powers in cases of necessity and emergency, equality in recruitment among the youth for different levels of education, the curtailing of legislation that violate rights and freedoms, more cautious application of harsh sentenc-ing, physical abuse policy reforms, the empowering of trade unions, guaran-tees for workers’ right to strike and freedom of the press.

The party also pressed for protect-ing the rights of women, people with disabilities, and children.

SEP member Ahmed Imam said his party could not support the draft, as it did not prioritise the development of the country and its citizens, claiming many of the provisions were similar to the 1971 constitution. He pointed to powers allotted to the president that had remained unchanged with regards to appointing the heads of important state institutions. Members of the party warned that the existence of an upper legislative house as mentioned in the new constitution was contrary to the consensus to completely cancel it.

Aboul Fotouh’s party also object-ed to the authority given to Al-Azhar over Islamic law, saying it believed that Al-Azhar should only play a consulta-tive role.

On Sunday Al-Dostour Party called on all political factions in Egypt to

unite and develop criteria to form a new Constituent Assembly in an ef-fort to promote consensus that it claims does not currently exist in the assembly or President Mohamed Morsy’s administration.

A large group of progressive and leftist parties staged demonstrations against the constitution on 12 and 19 October. Groups that have voiced disapproval over the draft include Al-Dostour Party, the Popular Current, the Revolutionary Democratic Coali-tion, the Free Egyptians Party, 6 April Youth Movement. The groups claim that the current Constituent Assembly does not accurately reflect society and has been dominated by the ideologies of the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups.

Some Salafi parties have also ex-pressed disdain for the draft constitu-tion, especially the wording of Article 2, which ultraconservative Islamists have argued should call for “provisions” of Islamic law, rather than “principles” as is currently stated.

The Administrative Judiciary Court decides the fate of the assembly on Tuesday. If the current Constituent Assembly is dissolved by the court, President Morsy will be responsible for forming what would be Egypt’s third attempt at creating a body to draft the constitution.

www.thedailynewsegypt.com

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012 Daily news egypt 3

Finnish ship SV Estelle enters the Israeli southern port of Ashdod after being intercepted by the Israeli navy in interna-tional waters as it tried to reach the Gaza Strip

From right, Afraa Galaby, Naguib Ghadba and Rafif Joejati discussing the fu-ture for Syria at the Arab Forum for Alternatives in Cairo

Alber Saber's mother, left, and supporters arrive for a hearing in his court case (File photo)

ship to gaza interceptedActivists are expected to be deported to their home countries

syrian opposition announces democratic transition report in CairoThe report aims to draw a map of post-revolution Syria

Complaint filed with the prosecutor general over treatment of saberSaber claims he is ill treated and subjected to poor prison conditions

Draft constitution under attack

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The National Council for Women deplored the absence of a guarantee that international conventions are binding or that the state will enforce gender equality

Continued from page 1

Badawy also claims that many of the workers have left this workers union since it was set up. DPW also released a document claiming just over 80 per cent of the port workers are against the strike. The document is not dated and it was not possible to verify these figures.

Saud Omar, the leader of the Suez Labour Union (SLU) warned against us-ing violence to end the strike saying “the use of any means of violence will not

work and will not lead to the desired goal of resuming work.” He also said he will conduct an investigation into the running of DPW in Sokhna.

The strike in Sokhna Port started at the beginning of September and initially the workers only slowed their rate of work. The dispute is over pay and the dismissal of eight workers, and when negotiations over these issues broke down, the workers completely shut the port on 12 October.

There was a counter demonstration last Monday by port workers and DPW

employees in order to highlight the ef-fects of the strike on the livelihoods of 8,000 families working directly and in-directly with the port.

Badawy confirmed that two ships have been held in the port with the cargo still onboard since the full closure of the port ten days ago. It is thought that amongst the cargo of these ships are perishable food products.

Many companies have threatened to reroute their cargo ships because of the strike.

Claims of sokhna port being black listed are false

www.thedailynewsegypt.com

4 Daily news egypt TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012

skandil@thedailynewsegypt.com

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Beirut, (AFP) - Lebanese troops and gunmen exchanged fire in a Sunni district of Beirut on Monday, raising fears Lebanon could be engulfed in sec-tarian violence after the murder of a top security official blamed on Syria.

The army promptly said it was de-termined to restore order in Lebanon, with the northern port of Tripoli shaken by fighting between partisans and op-ponents of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad that killed five people.

Lebanon has been on edge since Friday, when police intelligence chief General Wissam Al-Hassan died in a Beirut car bombing. That immediately prompted calls for Prime Minister Na-jib Mikati, whose cabinet is dominated by Damascus ally Hezbollah, to resign.

Amid fears Lebanon will be further affected by the conflict in Syria, the en-voys to Beirut of the UN Security Coun-cil’s permanent members met President Michel Sleiman and condemned any at-tempt to destabilise the situation and called for national unity.

The army is “committed to its role of stopping security breaches and main-taining civil order,” a statement from the high command said.

“Recent developments prove decid-edly that the country is going through a critical time, and the level of tension in some areas has reached unprecedented levels,” it said.

It will take “resolute measures, par-ticularly in areas of mounting sectarian friction... to prevent the assassination of martyred General Wissam al-Hassan from being exploited as an opportunity to murder the nation as a whole.”

The military also appealed to all po-litical forces to be wary of their words and any calls for mobilisation, “because

the fate of the nation is at stake.”Lebanon is a multi-faith country in

which Christians, Shi'a and Sunni Mus-lims each make up about one-third of the population.

It has a complex, but unwritten ar-rangement under which the president must always be a Maronite Christian, the premier a Sunni and the speaker of parliament a Shi'a.

The army statement came as troops responded after being fired on as they tried to clear a road in a Sunni district of Beirut that had been blocked by partisans of opposition leader Saad Hariri despite his calls for them to stay off the streets.

One of the gunmen told AFP a local resident had been killed in the shooting.

In the northern port of Tripoli, a Sunni bastion where opposition to Assad is strong, a woman and four youths died during fighting between Sunnis and Ala-wites, an offshoot of Shiite Islam to which Assad belongs, security sources said.

A four-year-old girl was wounded, as were three soldiers hit as troops at-tempted to restore calm.

Clashes have erupted regularly in Tripoli as tensions spill over the border from Syria, where a 19-month-old anti-regime revolt has left more than 34,000 people dead.

In the capital, six people were wounded after the army made a pre-dawn sweep through the Sunni district of Tariq Jdideh in pursuit of armed men,

and automatic weapons and anti-tank rocket fire could be heard.

Hariri, a former premier who heads Lebanon’s parliamentary opposi-tion, said he was determined to oust the government of Prime Minister Najib Mi-kati “by peaceful and democratic means.”

Sunnis are furious over the perceived Syrian assassination of Hassan, also a Sunni, who was noted for pursuing alleged Syr-ian crimes in Lebanon, including the 2005 assassination of Hariri’s father, Rafiq.

Hassan was laid to rest on Sunday amid calls for Mikati to stand down.

Hezbollah is a strong ally of Assad and of Iran. Its militia, which never disarmed after the 1975-90 civil war, is the most powerful military force in the country.

Khartoum (AFP) - A deadly attack on peacekeepers in Sudan involved weap-ons “never used before” and may have aimed to prevent them reaching an area where violence had been reported, the mission told AFP on Monday.

The ambush on Wednesday about 10 kilometres from Hashaba North in North Darfur state killed one South African member of the African Union-UN Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) and wounded three others.

“This criminal attack against a UNA-

MID convoy of 16 vehicles was carried out by unidentified assailants who have used arsenals of high-calibre weapons that were never used before,” UNA-MID spokeswoman Aicha Elbasri said in a written reply to AFP questions.

“This includes mortars, medium ma-chineguns, rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47 rifles and anti-tank guns.”

She said an armoured personnel carri-er was hit several times by weapons fire.

The ambush occurred while a UN-AMID convoy of military, police and

civilian personnel was on its way to the Hashaba area, where the United States says more than 70 civilians died in September from fighting and aerial bombardments between rebels and Su-danese government forces.

“This well-prepared attack against [the] UNAMID verification mission could mean that it was deliberately car-ried out to prevent the mission from accessing Hashaba and assessing the situation following recent reports of violence in the area,” Elbasri said.

Darfur’s top official, Eltijani Seisi, was out of the country and could not be reached for comment on Monday.

Much of the Darfur unrest now is linked to pro-government Arab groups, which fight among themselves as well as against the regime, humanitarian sources have said.

Rebels fighting to overthrow the gov-ernment told AFP that the UNAMID convoy had been stopped by “militia.”

“UNAMID continues to exploit ways and means to access Hashaba. It is plan-ning for another verification mission to Hashaba in line with its mandate,” which is to protect civilians, Elbasri said, calling for the government and UNAMID to jointly investigate the attack on the convoy.

It was the second deadly ambush of UNAMID peacekeepers this month.

The latest attack came on the day that a delegation of European Union ambassadors visited Darfur and ex-pressed concern to local officials about “the recent deterioration in security in some parts” of Sudan’s far-west region, which is about the size of France.

Violence has eased since the early

days of the nine-year-old war but vari-ous conflicts persist in Darfur: rebel-government clashes, inter-Arab and tribal fighting, as well as carjackings and other banditry.

Ethnic African rebels rose up against the Arab-dominated Khartoum govern-ment in 2003.

In response, the government un-leashed state-backed Janjaweed Arab militia in a conflict that shocked the world and led to allegations of genocide, followed by the deployment of UNA-MID almost five years ago.

Before the latest attack UNAMID’s act-ing chief, Aichatou Mindaoudou, spoke of “an increasing number of security-related incidents in North Darfur, including armed clashes between members of different communities with high civilian casualties.”

It is an “alarming development” which calls for urgent implementation of a government plan to disband armed militias and combat “outlaw groups,” she said in Khartoum.

North Darfur’s Deputy Governor, Al-Fateh Abdel Aziz Abdel Nabi, told the EU delegation that security had greatly improved in recent years and any inci-dents are “isolated”.

On 2 October, four Nigerian UNA-MID peacekeepers died in an ambush near El-Geneina in West Darfur.

Sudanese authorities said they de-tained suspects in that case but have given no details.

The dead South African is the 43rd peacekeeper from UNAMID to be killed in hostile action but UN sources have said they were unaware of anybody previously being brought to justice for the attacks.

Gaza City (AFP) - Israeli air strikes killed two Gaza militants on Monday as they clashed with troops who crossed the border on the eve of a landmark visit by the Qatari emir, medical sources said.

The flareup provoked threats of re-venge from the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the ruling Hamas movement, and a pledge from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netan-yahu that there would be no immunity for those firing on the Jewish state.

Both strikes took place around the northern town of Beit Hanun where militants were firing mortar shells at an Israeli tank and several military vehicles which had crossed the border into Gaza territory, witnesses and security sources said.

The first strike hit north of Beit Ha-nun, critically wounding four Qassam Brigades militants, one of whom later died of his injuries, medics and the mili-tant group said.

As the clashes continued, Israel launched a second air strike east of Beit Hanun, killing a militant from the Popular Resistance Committees (PRC) and critically wounding another man, the same sources said.

The Qassam Brigades confirmed that the first strike had killed one of its mili-

tants and critically wounded another three, naming the dead man as Abderah-man Abu Jalaleh, 25, and describing him as a local commander.

The second strike killed a PRC mili-tant whom the group named as Yasser Al-Tarabin. The identity of the injured man was not immediately clear.

The Israeli military said the both strikes had targeted “a rocket launch-ing squad.”

“The squad was targeted in response to mortar shell fire at a routine IDF (army) patrol in the area, near the Israeli kibbutz of Nir Am,” a statement said of the first strike. An identical statement was issued following the second.

The flareup comes on the eve of a high-profile visit by the emir of Qatar to the Gaza Strip, the first such trip by an Arab head of state since Hamas took over the territory in 2007.

The military refused to say whether troops were operating on the Gaza side of the frontier, saying only “they were near the security fence on a routine patrol.”

Hamas militants usually observe a de facto truce on rocket fire targeting Isra-el, but the rare show of force appeared to be a direct response to the incursion.

“The Zionist enemy continues its crimes and arrogance against our land and people... because of its desire to blow up the situation,” the Qassam Bri-gades said in a statement.

“The enemy will not be able to tie our hands and his crime will not go un-answered.”

Netanyahu also issued a warning of his own.

“There is Hamas, which is supported by Iran, which is firing rockets at us and who will fire again. We will not allow any-one to arm himself, to fire rockets at us and to think he can enjoy immunity,” he said in remarks distributed by his office.

“They will not escape punishment. We attacked them before (they fire on Israel), we attacked them after, and we will prevent them from arming them-selves,” he said.

“We will not let them escape without punishment and they know that is what we are doing.”

Marseille (AFP) – Two men and a woman appeared in a French court Monday in a case over a Cannes Film Festival high-end prostitution ring that had ties to a son of slain Libyan dictator Moammar Gaddafi.

Seven men and a woman went on trial in the southern port city of Mar-seille, though the five chief figures are on the run and are being tried in ab-sentia.

They include Elie Nahas, a Lebanese who claimed to run a modeling agency employing young women recruited in South America, France and eastern Europe.

The three who turned up in court were: an alleged escort girl from Cannes, Sabrina Samari, who has ad-mitted to procuring women; a Venezu-elan named Felix Farias who worked for a branch of Nahas’s agency; and a Lebanese driver, Antoine El Khoury.

Nahas is accused of organising a birthday bash for one of Gaddafi’s sons Mutassim in 2004 costing $1.5 million with several stars and about 20 models in attendance.

Mutassim Gaddafi was killed with his father on October 20 last year. Investi-gators never questioned the son.

Farias also caused a scandal in 2007 when he turned up at Paris’s Charles de Gaulle airport with eight young women, one of whom was a minor, to

attend the Cannes Film Festival. They were refused entry.

They were due to stay on a 136-me-tre-long luxury yacht, La Savarona, which had been rented for 350,000 Euros a week.

Wiretapped telephone conversa-tions from the time showed the in-volvement of four Lebanese nationals, a Venezuelan and two escort girls from Cannes in an alleged prostitution ring, whose clients were rich men from the Middle East.

“Those really responsible are ab-sent or have fled,” said Franck De Vita, the lawyer for Samari.

According to Patrick Rizzo, lawyer for an anti-procuring charity that is a civil party to the trial, it was “the po-litical context” in 2007 and 2008 that hampered the legal investigation.

“Colonel Gaddafi was received at the Elysee (French presidential pal-ace) at the time, he was France’s good friend,” Rizzo said.

“All this context did not favour in-ternational investigations.”

The inquiry established that young women of various nationalities includ-ing models, beauty queens and escort girls, were recruited, especially during the Cannes film festival for clients from the Middle East, Saudi Arabia and Ku-wait ready to pay thousands of dollars for their services.

Dubai (AFP)-Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) second-in-com-mand denied his own death at the hands of the Yemeni army in an audio message posted on jihadist forums, SITE Intel-ligence reported on Monday.

The monitoring service said Saeed Al-Shehri accused the army of fabricat-ing his death to “cover up the killing of civilians by American aircraft” in an au-dio message produced by the group’s media arm and posted online on 20 October.

“The Yemeni government didn’t stop claiming responsibility for the killing of innocent Muslims in Al-Bayda (in south Yemen) on behalf of America, and when it saw that the people weren’t tricked by this lie, they brought in another lie in order to hide the issue, which is the killing of Saeed Al-Shehri,” he said.

On 10 September, the Yemeni de-fence ministry announced troops had killed Shehri in a raid in the eastern Ye-meni province of Hadramawt.

At the time, the ministry said “six other terrorist elements accompany-ing (Shehri) were also killed,” adding that his death dealt a “painful blow

to what’s left of” Yemen-based AQAP, which Washington considers to be the global jihadist group Al-Qaeda’s deadli-est and most active franchise.

A tribal source told AFP after the raid that a ground operation had taken place in Hadramawt, but would not confirm Shehri’s death.

Shehri’s audio comments refer to repeated US drone attacks in Yemen that target Al-Qaeda suspects in the country’s mostly lawless south and east.

Shehri escaped death in September last year when US drones carried out several air strikes on the village of Al-Mahfad in the southern Abyan province, a former Al-Qaeda stronghold.

The militant leader was released from Guantanamo in 2007 and was flown to Saudi Arabia where he was put through a rehabilitation programme.

But after completing the programme, Shehri disappeared and later resurfaced as AQAP’s second-in-charge.

Al-Qaeda never confirmed Shehri’s death and last month, Saudi Arabia an-nounced it too could not confirm that he had died during the Yemeni army operation.

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A supporter of the March 14 movement, which opposes the Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad, stands facing Lebanese security forces during a demonstration outside the governmental palace in Beirut

A Sudanese displaced boy looks at a Union-United Nations Mission in Darfur soldier standing guard at the internally displaced persons’ Abushok camp in El-Fasher, in Sudan’s North Darfur state

Yemeni Defence Minister Major General Mohammed Nasser Ahmed (second from left) visiting a wounded Yemeni soldier at a hospital in the southern city of Aden

An Israeli helicopter drops flares over the Gaza Strip (File photo)

Prostitution trial linked to Gaddafi son opens in France

al-Qaeda yemen deputy leader dismisses death reports

troops, gunmen exchange fire in Beirut as tensions rise

Darfur peacekeepers hit by weapons ‘never used before’

two gaza militants killed in israel air strikes

www.thedailynewsegypt.comBusinessTUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012 Daily news egypt 5

By Islam Serour

Prime Minister Hisham Qandil, ar-rived yesterday in Algeria for a three-day visit amidst speculative press re-ports over the visit’s agenda.

State-owned Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported the objec-tive of Qandil’s visit to Algeria is to hold talks with the Algerian govern-ment over solidifying economic re-lations and boosting mutual invest-ment.

“During his visit to Algeria PM Qandil will deliver a message of President Morsy to his Algerian counterpart, President Abdelaziz Bouteflika regarding enhancing co-operation between two countries in all fields,” Egyptian Press reported, citing MENA.

“Qandil’s visit to Algeria is the first of an Egyptian prime minister after the 25 January revolution,” Egyptian Ambassador to Algeria, Ezz El-Din Fahmy said, noting that the last visit to Algeria by an Egyptian prime min-ister was in 2008 by Ahmed Nazif, former PM under Mubarak.

Qandil was accompanied by a dele-gation of government officials; includ-ing the foreign minister, ministers of petroleum, industry and foreign trade, planning and international co-operation, and housing; and a num-ber of businessmen, MENA reported yesterday.

Reuters reported that the Egyp-tian government will discuss $2 bil-lion assistance from Algeria to help Egypt overcome its current financial crisis.

The Egyptian delegation’s visit in-tends to encourage Algeria, one of Egypt’s biggest suppliers of butane, to assist in mitigating the looming butane crisis that threatens Egypt, Algerian and Egyptian news out-lets reported, quoting an unnamed source.

Egypt imports up to 50 per cent of its butane, Ibrahim Zahran, former president of Khalda Petroleum Com-pany, told Al-Ahram Weekly. Egyptian households, as well as restaurants, cafes and hotels, rely extensively on butane for cooking.

Reuters reported two officials confirmed that the Egyptian govern-ment was seeking aid from Algeria; the two officials cannot ascertain what kind of aid the Egyptian delega-tion would demand.

By Hend El-Behary

Schneider electric company (SEC) in Egypt has inaugurated a solar power plant in Abu Monkar village, in New Val-ley governorate. The plant’s daily produc-tion equates to 108 kilowatts per hour, said Hany Ebrahim, marketing manager of the new and renewable energy section of the company.

“SEC has been investing in Egypt since 1983; the company’s investments in the Egyptian market reached EGP 250 million in the form of energy, build-ings, infrastructure, oil and gas” said Ahmed Fateen, low voltage equipment and systems market manager.

“This project reflects the SEC initia-tive step towards the social responsi-bilities in Egypt” Said Ebrahim.

Ebrahim added that the project aims to provide the village with 24 hours con-

tinuous electric current via clean and en-vironmentally friendly electric sources.

“We picked Abu Monkar village es-pecially because the closest electric sta-tion to it is 120 km away, which makes the village dependent mainly on genera-tors which can work for only few hours; it gives a good index that our project won’t be useless,” said Ebrahim.

Each year SEC is doing a develop-ment energy project, for instance it had improved the quality of automatic con-trol of students of Galal Fahmy School in 2010; meanwhile in 2011 it established a solar energy laboratory in the faculty of engineering in Ain Shams University.

In 2012 the New & Renewable En-ergy Authority along with SEC submit-ted two projects, to connect a solar generator to electric stations in both Hurgada and Komobo cities, in order to eradicate blackouts.

LINKonLINE, an online publishing company operating under Orascom Telecom announced yesterday its acquisition of Arabia.com, an Arabic web portal.

Through its acquisition of Arabia.com portal, LINKonLINE seek to en-hance the portal’s Arabic content pro-viding a range of diverse subjects includ-ing sports, technology, auto, news and entertainment.

LINKonLINE added also that it will implement new technology, which will differentiate Arabia.com portal from any other portals across the Middle East.

The new technology guarantees easy and convenient reading for all visitors, the company said.

LINKonLINE has been seeking to establish a strong presence in the Gulf region, as recent figures show that the number of internet users in the Gulf region has reached 60 per cent.

Mostafa Kamel, managing director of LINKonLINE, said, “we chose Dubai to be the hub of launching the new look

of Arabia.com and a permanent loca-tion for our headquarters, based on the strength of the UAE as a business and commercial hub, and Dubai’s particular strengths as a media centre.”

Kamel added that his company plans to target a wide range of internet users, both male and female, especially people aged between 20-49 years old. This seg-ment of internet users shows great in-terest in knowing the latest news and updates on sports, entertainment, tech-nology and cars.

“LINKonLINE works regularly on studying the needs of internet users though conducting studies and re-search,” Kamel noted.

LINKonLINE, which is considered one of the leading online publishing companies, was founded in 2002. It exists in 15 different countries across the Middle East and North Africa re-gion. LINKonLINE has been the force behind some of the Arab World’s most active portals including masrawy.com, yallakora.com, otlob.com, and most re-cently jawhara.me.

Reaffirming its uninterrupted com-mitment and contributions to the welfare of underdeveloped areas in Egypt, Jotun Egypt has organised a 4 day training course on painting tech-niques comprising 7 training sessions and was dedicated to the residents of Ezbet Khirallah in Cairo.

The training was organised in cooperation with Peace and Plenty Association, which has a remarkable experience in creating and applying many developmental projects in Ez-bet Khirallah area.

The training sessions comprised a theoretical and practical training,

with “paint your own house” con-cept, which provides trainees with a sense of belongingness by adding aes-thetical values to the neighborhood where they use to live.

The whole 7 sessions were en-rolled by 120 residents of Ezbet Khi-rallah, to help unemployed residents finding decent and skillful jobs, by providing them with an unequalled opportunity to acquire new skills and pursue a new path in their lives.

“Jotun would like to thank every-body who participated in bringing about a huge success to these training sessions. We are proud to help unem-

ployed residents in Ezbet Khirallah in acquiring a new handcraft, which provides them with a valuable tool to find a good job. On the same hand, we will continue launching new and creative initiatives, which embody our profound faith in a better future for all Egyptians” said, Yasser Hassan, Marketing and National Retail Sales Manager - Jotun Egypt.

The initiative coincides with Jo-tun’s celebration of 25th anniversary in Egypt, which is an excellent op-portunity to pay back to the Egyptian community, by implementing creative CSR initiatives in Ezbet Khirallah.

Company Turn Over Market Cap.Name Daily YTD 12-Mths. Max. Price Min. Price (EGP Mill.) (EGP Mill.)

Commercial Bank COMI Banks 38.05 38.17 0.77% 104.12% 52.44% 38.80 37.75 13.64 357,423 22,622.98NSGB NSGB Banks 47.00 47.34 0.40% 133.09% 73.85% 47.65 46.80 6.264 132,330 20,912.72Ezz Steel ESRS Basic Resources 10.4 10.42 0.19% 179.36% 68.61% 10.58 10.28 7.54 723,067 5,649.96ELSWEDY ELECTRIC SWDY Industrial Goods and Services and Automobiles 26.51 26.54 0.15% 27.97% 20.58% 26.79 26.50 0.409 15,407 5,920.58MRRIDIVE MOIL Industrial Goods and Services and Automobiles 1.12 1.13 0.00% -6.50% -33.75% 1.13 1.12 0.21 31,116 404.99AIC Contracting AIND Financial Services excluding Banks 0.55 0.56 1.82% 7.69% -18.84% 0.57 0.54 5.064 9,110,249 294.04Amer Group Holding AMER Financial Services excluding Banks 0.72 0.71 0.00% 29.09% -3.18% 0.72 0.70 2.20 3,106,299 2,158.18EK Holding EKHO Financial Services excluding Banks 1.26 1.26 0.80% 28.57% 23.53% 1.27 1.25 5.276 685,781 1,049.12EFG-Hermes HRHO Financial Services excluding Banks 11.77 11.79 -0.59% 17.78% -4.46% 11.94 11.70 8.81 747,381 5,672.58Pioneers Holding PIOH Financial Services excluding Banks 5.41 5.48 -0.18% 146.85% 64.07% 5.59 5.39 7.206 1,316,101 2,745.00Citadel Capital CCAP Financial Services excluding Banks 4.07 4.07 -0.49% 59.61% 17.29% 4.13 4.03 9.51 2,337,473 2,673.71Raya Holding RAYA Technology 6.23 6.22 3.84% 78.74% 55.50% 6.30 5.97 6.046 972,481 384.70Telecom Egypt ETEL Telecommunications 13.64 13.51 0.00% 2.27% -8.72% 13.65 13.45 5.49 405,880 23,062.54Orascom Telecom Media And Technology OTMT Telecommunications 0.59 0.59 0.00% 70.88% 59.63% 0.60 0.57 23.125 39,258,885 3,094.96Orascom Telecom ORTE Telecommunications 3.77 3.75 0.81% 116.96% 102.68% 3.78 3.70 22.18 5,922,640 19,513.97Sidi Kerir Petrochemicals SKPC Chemicals 13.54 13.53 -0.07% 13.60% 10.18% 13.58 13.50 1.015 74,987 7,108.50Egyptian Financial and Industrial EFIC Chemicals 11.32 11.44 0.00% 28.40% 4.86% 11.60 11.27 1.95 170,804 792.81AMOC AMOC Oil and Gas 77.00 77.52 -1.19% 15.81% 15.91% 78.00 76.82 2.194 28,306 6,754.55Juhayna Food Industries JUFO Food and Beverage 6.02 6.01 3.26% 54.10% 27.87% 6.04 5.87 5.97 993,889 4,109.23Orascom Construction Industries (OCI) OCIC Construction and Materials 260.10 263.25 -0.77% 30.87% 15.07% 268.44 259.99 30.028 114,064 55,429.27Delta Construction & Rebuilding DCRC Construction and Materials 7.46 7.43 0.13% -3.38% -25.33% 7.57 7.35 0.61 81,408 171.45Modern Co. For Water Proofing WATP Construction and Materials 2.25 2.25 0.45% -2.17% -6.64% 2.27 2.22 1.425 633,710 228.48Palm Hills PHDC Real Estate 2.54 2.56 -1.16% 134.86% 88.24% 2.61 2.53 17.23 6,721,056 2,715.15TMG Holding TMGH Real Estate 4.77 4.81 -0.62% 62.50% 29.30% 4.90 4.76 6.137 1,274,692 9,987.64National Real Estate Bank NRPD Real Estate 22.1 22.23 -0.18% 13.30% -22.76% 22.79 21.94 1.57 70,576 86.91Six of October OCDI Real Estate 21.90 22.00 -0.63% 176.04% 52.04% 22.19 21.77 2.859 129,974 2,007.57El Kahera Housing & Development ELKA Real Estate 6.27 6.33 -0.47% 63.14% 36.13% 6.56 6.22 2.75 434,527 596.25Arab Cotton Ginning ACGC Personal and Household Products 4.20 4.21 -0.94% 99.53% 34.08% 4.27 4.17 6.141 1,458,904 1,150.97Oriental Weavers ORWE Personal and Household Products 23.5 23.44 -0.76% -15.39% -16.83% 23.50 23.25 0.07 2,900 2,125.80Egyptian Tourism Resorts EGTS Travel & Leisure 1.13 1.13 -0.88% 34.52% 9.71% 1.15 1.12 1.262 1,112,026 1,197.00

Daily Performance Volume Trade

Reuters Code

Last Price

SectorClose Price

Returns

Market Brief

Daily EGX30 index performance

Market indices performance

Markets No. Volume Value(LE) TradesListed 176 106,689,111 352,982,268 21,368

Stocks 173 106,663,008 324,579,917 21,363

PDBonds 2 25,587 28,349,384 2

Bonds 1 516 52,967 3

Nilex 7 371,151 2,455,920 217

OTC 19 1,377,228 5,708,339 358

Deals 15 474,964 4,689,302 157

Orders 4 902,264 1,019,037 201

Total 202 108,437,490 361,146,528 21,943

Total Market Cap

Value Daily Ch. YTD Ch.5,721.09 0.08% 57.94%

527.02 -0.05% 26.81%

872.06 -0.19% 35.61%

6,682.43 0.05% 70.23%

Volume Value(000's) (LE 000's)

Listed stocks 174 106,664 324,633 21,366

Gainers 56 33,457 149,800 10,281

Decliners 91 26,289 135,886 8,853

Unchanged 27 46,917 38,946 2,232

392,705,140,954

No.No. of Trades

Direction

EGX 20 Capped

IndexEGX 30

EGX 70

EGX 100Markets No. Volume Value(LE) Trades

Listed 176 106,689,111 352,982,268 21,368

Stocks 173 106,663,008 324,579,917 21,363

PDBonds 2 25,587 28,349,384 2

Bonds 1 516 52,967 3

Nilex 7 371,151 2,455,920 217

OTC 19 1,377,228 5,708,339 358

Deals 15 474,964 4,689,302 157

Orders 4 902,264 1,019,037 201

Total 202 108,437,490 361,146,528 21,943

Total Market Cap

Value Daily Ch. YTD Ch.5,721.09 0.08% 57.94%

527.02 -0.05% 26.81%

872.06 -0.19% 35.61%

6,682.43 0.05% 70.23%

Volume Value(000's) (LE 000's)

Listed stocks 174 106,664 324,633 21,366

Gainers 56 33,457 149,800 10,281

Decliners 91 26,289 135,886 8,853

Unchanged 27 46,917 38,946 2,232

392,705,140,954

No.No. of Trades

Direction

EGX 20 Capped

IndexEGX 30

EGX 70

EGX 100

Markets No. Volume Value(LE) TradesListed 176 106,689,111 352,982,268 21,368

Stocks 173 106,663,008 324,579,917 21,363

PDBonds 2 25,587 28,349,384 2

Bonds 1 516 52,967 3

Nilex 7 371,151 2,455,920 217

OTC 19 1,377,228 5,708,339 358

Deals 15 474,964 4,689,302 157

Orders 4 902,264 1,019,037 201

Total 202 108,437,490 361,146,528 21,943

Total Market Cap

Value Daily Ch. YTD Ch.5,721.09 0.08% 57.94%

527.02 -0.05% 26.81%

872.06 -0.19% 35.61%

6,682.43 0.05% 70.23%

Volume Value(000's) (LE 000's)

Listed stocks 174 106,664 324,633 21,366

Gainers 56 33,457 149,800 10,281

Decliners 91 26,289 135,886 8,853

Unchanged 27 46,917 38,946 2,232

392,705,140,954

No.No. of Trades

Direction

EGX 20 Capped

IndexEGX 30

EGX 70

EGX 100

Qandil visits algeria for economic talks

By Mohamed SalahEldin

The Egyptian and Cypriot governments have agreed to cooperate in exploring offshore oil and gas in the waters be-tween the two countries.

Egyptian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Ossama Kamal, stat-ed during his meeting with the Cypriot Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, Neoclis Sylikiotis, that Egypt will send a delegation to Cyprus to pur-sue cooperation, according to Al-Masry Al-Youm.

Kamal said the Cypriots asked to use Egyptian expertise in reaching gas and

oil discovery agreements, especially in deep water, and also in seismic survey-ing.

The Cypriot minister said his coun-try signed the first agreement to de-marcate its maritime borders with Egypt in 2003.

Sylikiotis also stated Cyprus will send a technical delegation to Egypt next month, confirming that there are various areas of potential coop-eration between the two countries, in the fields of infrastructure for oil and gas production, the protection of maritime environment and the ex-change of expertise.

Many experts expressed worries however, concerning the relationship between Cyprus and Israel in the field of energy.

Petroleum engineering professor Ramadan Abo El-Ela called on the Egyptian government to consider the political aspect in its relations with Cyprus, confirming that Cyprus en-joys a special relationship with Israel regarding deepwater gas exploration and exploitation.

Abo El-Ela added that the petro-leum ministry must coordinate with the president and the foreign minis-try before taking any steps.

A source in the Ministry of Petro-leum and Natural Resources stated that demarcation of the maritime borders between Egypt and its neighbours took place according to international law and through joint committees comprising of experts from Egypt and neighbour-ing countries.

The source stated that Cyprus and Israel had not discovered any oil fields in Egyptian Waters and that the maps of the Egyptian maritime territory are drawn by experts from the Ministry of Defence and the Min-istry of Foreign Affairs, reported Al-Ahram.

Egypt and Cyprus to jointly explore Mediterranean deepwaters for natural gas

schneider provides new Valley with solar energy

linKonline acquires arabia.com portal

Jotun egypt reaffirms its commitment to egyptian community

Jotun Paint Academy trains 120 residents of Ezbet Khirallah on painting techniques during a 4 day training sessions

egypt and Cyprus to jointly explore Mediterranean deepwaters

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www.thedailynewsegypt.com commentary6 Daily news egypt TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012 Disclaimer: Commentaries published

by Daily News Egypt do not reflect the position of the paper, but the independent opinions of their authors.

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Egypt, the world’s biggest wheat importer, will be able to cease im-porting wheat for the production of state-subsidised bread if it builds enough silos to store locally-pro-duced grain, Agriculture Minister Salah Abdel Momen told Reuters on Sunday.

To put this idea into context, of the 18.8 million tonnes of wheat consumed in Egypt each year, around half is grown locally, Reuters reports.

Subsidised bread alone accounts for 9.6 million tonnes of wheat consumption. Last season, Egypt’s harvest was 9.5 million tonnes, the agriculture minister said.

The problem here isn’t the amount produced but wastage through inef-ficient storage and wheat sold on to private bakeries.

By storing more of its locally-grown wheat for subsidised bread production, Egypt might be able to cut down on how much it spends im-porting wheat for subsidised bread production. But that’s a big “if ” con-sidering the following, which by no means is an exhaustive list

Investment in proper silos has been mooted for several years and nothing has changed. Also, private bakeries may contest this decision as it will directly impact the amount of wheat they receive. Additionally, there are some shady figures in-volved in the wheat business. For one, the chairman of Egyptian grain trader Venus was accused of using dubious ties with the former regime to profiteer in the grains market. He was subsequently acquitted of any wrongdoing, but people close to him have since been arrested and detained.

Those people include Gamal Ed-din Abdel Aziz, the secretary of for-mer President Hosni Mubarak who is accused of pushing his wife Magda Abdel Fattah into partnership with Venus, which Egypt Independent de-scribes as having “won most of the tenders made by the General Au-thority for Supplying Commodities by a direct order from the secretary of the former president.”

It is not as straightforward as it first appears.

***The government is preparing the

final, final, final draft of its economic programme needed to secure the proposed $4.8 billion from the In-ternational Monetary Fund (IMF).

Finance Minister Momtaz Al-Saeed even denied reports that the draft had been completed and pre-sented to the cabinet. It seems an odd denial at a time when investors and the business community are expecting more than a draft of an economic programme that should have been written months earlier.

The economic programme, which is a re-draft of an earlier programme presented to the IMF, will be com-pleted by the end of this month, in time for the IMF delegation visit, the finance minister said.

Most of the details of the eco-nomic plan have already been re-vealed, including raising the price of 95 octane fuel, which is used for more expensive cars, and value-add-ed taxes placed on various products, including cigarette packets.

State-run Ahram Online summed up the main point of this new eco-nomic plan as follows, “the pro-gramme, based on the scant details available about it, does not seem to differ significantly from an earlier programme prepared by the gov-ernment for a previous round of negotiations with the IMF in March.”

***Meanwhile, as Egypt struggles to

get its act together on the economy, the country appears keen on getting Gulf money as soon as possible.

Sources told Ahram Online that Khairat El-Shater, the first choice for the Muslim Brotherhood’s pres-idency, visited the Qatari capital Doha last week to meet “top offi-cials” and arrange for the full pay-ment of Qatar’s loan to be made into the Central Bank of Egypt be-fore the end of the year.

Qatar said it would pump $2 bil-lion into Egypt’s central bank, with the first instalment of $500 million already deposited and the second due to arrive this month.

The dates for the third and fourth installments have not been announced, but “sources speaking to Ahram Online say they may be moved forward from the first quar-ter of next year to November and December.”

El-Shater appears to be arrang-ing this transaction, according to the Ahram article. If true, the rumours that he’d been appointed Morsy’s economic adviser would make a lot of sense.

***“There’s no problem between

Iran and Egypt,” Iran’s Fars news agency reported president Mo-hamed Morsy as saying during his visit to Iran.

Apparently Iran and Egypt are putting everything behind them and starting a new era of trade ties, af-ter an Egyptian business delegation visited Iran last week.

There are already reports of the type of investment that could take place. Iran’s deputy oil minister said the Iranian government is willing to invest millions of dollars in oil and gas exploration in Egypt, state-run Al Ahram reported.

Iran used much of its reserves at home, and may be using more con-sidering a second phase of subsidy reforms has been delayed.

Still, for a country that holds the world’s fourth-largest proven oil reserves and the world’s second-largest gas reserves, it’s a little odd that Iran is looking to Egypt for oil and gas opportunities. This may be all propaganda.

Farah is a business journalist and founder of Rebel Economy, a blog focused on how regional economies are rebuilding after the Arab Spring.

Eid is upon us, which means that Eid movies are upon us, if you already couldn’t tell by their repetitive ads all over TV, all the time. Our Eid mov-ies offerings this year are as follows: Abdo Mota, a movie about a thug, which will naturally have at least six knife fights and two sha3by songs by Occa and Ortega; Miss Mama, a Yasmine Abdel Aaziz attempt at fam-ily comedy, where she will stick to her usual slapstick fanfare and make funny faces at the camera; and the current heavy at the box office, An Hour and a Half, which stars almost every actor in Egypt, with a report-edly unintentionally hilarious turn for Yosra El-Lozy playing a house-wife from Upper Egypt, about the intermingling drama (we know it’s drama because there is a lot of shouting and fighting and dramatic music, and that’s how we do drama) of those million characters, all while being on a train. So, as always, we are stuck with the two main cat-egories of Egyptian filmmaking of late: lowbrow slapstick comedy and hyper-dramatised movies about the everyday reality of poor Egyptians.As a friend recently told me dur-ing a conversation, if you watched the supreme majority of Egyptian movies over the past 10 years and thought about what they say about Egypt, (in terms of production, story, acting, et cetera), you will find them truly terrifying.

With notable exceptions, the majority of Egyptian movies seem to be made with consistent medi-ocrity, while pretending to be artis-tic because they seemingly reflect “Egyptian reality”; something I like to call the “Khaled Yusef” disease which has seemingly infected every aspect of our art scene. Every artist I know these days creates art that represents society and its problems, while I for one miss the days when art used to inspire it. I miss the days when artists appeared to be crazy in their efforts to create the inspi-

rational works of art that kept us all sane, in appreciation and in awe. It used to show us the things that we wanted to see around us, but reality never allowed to exist. Sure, this country has a lot of suffering and misery that we shouldn’t ignore, but their prevalence has made cul-tivating beauty and inspiration all the more imperative. Instead, all we have are constant reminders, in every medium, of the world we live in, of the injustices we all go through, of “the what is” instead of the “what could be.” Lazy. Just lazy art. And none more guilty of that offence than so called “revolution-ary” artists.

Yes, let’s make documentaries about the revolution. Let’s make movies about the revolution. Let’s make TV shows, exhibits, art show-ings, theatre plays, songs and graffiti, all about the revolution. Let’s pre-tend that revolutionary art isn’t sup-posed to be about art that revolu-tionises the art space that the artist occupies, or that challenges society and its norms, or even challenges the institutions that always try to control or censor art, but rather about creating art about the revo-lution. Let’s milk this cow dry, let’s utilise that never-closing Pandora ’s Box of injustice that constitutes our social ugliness and simply reflect it, over and over and over again, and not try to change it one bit. Yes, let’s do that. God knows the whole world is doing it, why shouldn’t we be equally bankrupt?

Speaking about revolutionary art, the next time I meet a “revolution-ary” director who complains about the censorship board messing or stalling his movie, I will give them a swift kick in the butt. Why do you submit your film to them? We are living in a state of lawlessness, as you all keep reminding us, then why bother with complying with something as archaic and fascist as the censorship board, especially

under a Muslim Brotherhood presi-dent? Why hasn’t this institution’s authority been challenged already? Who are they? What are their quali-fications to decide what is suitable and what isn’t for us to watch? What is their educational background? Why hasn’t anyone truly faced-off with them, or better, ignored them and challenged their authority? And why even bother with them, with the box office never being the way that any of your artistic movies makes its money, but rather by selling the viewership rights to movie channels that don’t require the censorship board’s approval to begin with? And if you need the box office to sustain the industry, then why hasn’t the in-dustry (actors, filmmakers, produc-tion houses, cinema conglomerates) fought back so far, even by simply not complying with the law? Now that would be both revolutionary and inspiring, because it would send the signal that it’s time to play out of the sandbox we confined ourselves in for decades, and maybe, just maybe, try something new, because appar-ently having a revolution didn’t cut it. Artists of Egypt, show me some-thing new. Please. I beg you.

Mahmoud Salem is a political activist, writer, and social media consultant. www.sandmonkey.org

egyptian pipe dreams? Final, final draft of economic plan Another fanciful pipe dream or is this a realistic ambition?

on social ugliness and beauty

The randomness by which this coun-try is run gives a sense of impending doom. The myth of how the Muslim Brotherhood is organised is busted, they are only organised during elec-tions... in how to gather their people and put them in buses to push for votes or fill up Tahrir Square. But that is where it stops. Our government is not made up of the Brotherhood, yet it is they who set the strategies and policies and put in place govern-ment priorities… is not this what the president and his office and ad-visers should be doing? Is it not their job to direct how the country is run? Well, myth busted brothers, you are chaotic and disorganised and in fact are an overall failure in management.

Every morning on the way to work, I get the feeling that the city was in battle the night before. Rub-ble fills the streets, rubbish flies in the wind, and wrecked cars line the sides of the road… and don’t get me started on traffic and air pollution. It is the morning after a war and every morning is the same! Where is the proof that ministers do in fact exist and that there are institutions with offices and employees and paper in this country? It seems like we are be-ing tricked, like there is no one in the cabinet, they are all make-believe.

Protests are ongoing on daily ba-sis by almost all sectors of society. Doctors, teachers, farmers, work-ers, students, post grad students, athletes, journalists, tour guides, government employees from the housing, petroleum and tax depart-ments, cabinet employees, residents of areas like Manzala and Ramlet

Boulaq and others. And this is not all, this is just off the top of my head. A couple of days ago, one of our reporters went to cover a pro-test and she stumbled upon four on her way there and there were still more except she had to get back to write the story ahead of deadline. Two more reporters were working on two other protests, and we re-ceived coverage from an additional one. On just one day!

It makes one wonder, where is the government? Is anyone going to their office in the morning… and if so, what do they do when they get there? Have tea and read the pa-pers while the country drowns in the sewers? What have they done to manage the gas and electricity shortages, the traffic, the rubbish, the chaos of the government offices, the schools, the hospitals, the slums, the wages, the insurance… and the list of crises goes on. How much money do we pay them from our taxes and our budget, so that they can sit and watch while we drown?

What we expected of a proper government was for them to come up with quick fixes for the urgent is-sues, a short-term plan for the com-ing few years and a long-term plan for the advancement of government institutions. So far, we have seen zilch. And I believe it is absurd to say they have only been in office for a short period, this is plain nonsense. The number of plans presented to our rulers in every ministry and in-stitution should have made their job easier. All they had to do is pick a plan they liked and start on it. There

is no lack of good ideas to manage the crisis; there is only lack of will.

From a management perspective, these people are failures. Obviously not one of them has ever taken a project management course, which would seriously come in handy when running a ministry… isn’t it all about projects at the end of the day? A plan with resources, cost, a timeline and criteria of success is what is needed right now. Project management also involves risk management, quality control and organisational develop-ment. This is the recipe, plain and simple. We do not need politicians to run the government, nor do we need academics, we need project managers for our ministries. We need those who focus on delivery. But alas, we are talking to the wind.

r.allam@thedailynewsegypt.com

Do we have a government?

Rana allaM

FaR ah haliMe

MahMoud SaleM

Rebel econoMy WR ap

The army’s anger phenomenonFahmi howeidyAl-Shorouk newspaper

Recent debate about false news that ex-army generals were banned from travelling worries Howeidy. The writ-er questions if there is actual anger stemming from the army over this and what the consequences of such irrita-tion could be. Attempting to analyse the issue, Howeidy believes there is uneasiness affecting the military as a whole. The sense of irritation accom-panies an unwise media approach adding to public fears of what could happen if the army really is angry. Sadly enough, the armed forces have trans-ferred their annoyance to the presi-dency, which in turn threw it to the Shura Council.

Having published false news about the army, the writer denounces the Shura Council’s decision to sack the newspaper editor who published the story and confirms a bold clarifica-tion and apology could have easily solved the problem. Stressing again the expanding misconception of the army’s frustration, Howeidy writes the groundless debate benefits anti-revolutionary groups. Proceeding with baseless talks which negatively affect our military, Howeidy stresses probably the best thing Morsy did was honour the former military gen-erals.

can we afford the army’s fury?Mohamed FathyAl-Watan newspaper

In a completely sardonic piece, Fathy jeers the army’s discontentment amid calls to hold accountable all former military officials named responsible for those killed and injured during the 25 January uprising. The writer asks why would the army be upset in the first place? And so what if it is genuinely un-easy? Why would Egyptians care if they are happy or not? He ironically writes that the former generals, some known for committing demeaning crimes against revolutionaries, should not be angry to know that Egyptians would not let go of their offences.

How many people have been killed and how many have been injured, dragged and beaten by army officers? Fathy affirms both current and former military officers are not angels sent from above. According to the writer, they committed crimes in Tahrir Square, inside the Egyptian museum and inside cells. Turning to President Morsy and his relation with former military generals, Fathy chides him for honouring them and appointing them as advisers and as-sistants. If Mina Danieal, Shiekh Emad Effat or Ahmed Harara have been of any importance, Morsy would not have cared about the army or its angry feel-ings, concludes the writer.

Who is egypt’s next president?Mohamed aminAl-Masry Al-Youm newspaper

With a perplexed political atmosphere and a set of groundless presidential de-cisions, Amin does not expect Morsy to be Egypt’s next president in 2016. The thought stuck in the writer’s mind when he reassessed the army’s role in the pres-idency as Egypt’s most powerful institu-tion. He dreamed of the coming presi-dential elections after he had recalled all Morsy’s decisions, especially those relat-ing to the judiciary. The institution of the presidency, initially, should not yield any challenges to the country. Regretfully, now most problems stem from Morsy’s palace, according to the writer.

After the revolution, the military has learnt one of the hardest lessons in Egypt’s history, especially when former Field Marshal Tantawi and his team were sacked from their positions. Amin thinks it was even disgraceful to exclude Tan-tawi from the 6 October celebrations. Chiding Morsy for many steps taken since he took office over 100 days ago, the writer continues the president’s early period in office has proven him as failing Egypt. The latest protests held in Tahrir Square “Egypt is not a village” was the newest message to Morsy, stat-ing Egyptians will not tolerate Muslim Brotherhood dominance, and most importantly, will not see the martyrs’ blood be lost in vain.

columnists ask why is the army angry?

Many writers have focused on a recent public debate over false news that ex-military generals were banned from travelling. on another note, some writers have criticised Morsy for his groundless decisions.

By Luiz Sanchez

Metal is an umbrella term which does the music little justice. It is a label that is applied, without knowledge of content or context of the music itself. This er-roneous interpretation of an art form , which constantly changes, has not suc-ceeded in eliminating its existence but has bred a subculture that is now a part of the very fabric of Egypt.

Anarchy – order within the chaosOne band which has delved into the

metal genre is Anarchy, a group of five Egyptian men whose upcoming (and as of yet unnamed) debut album tells tales of mythology. Their songs go through different periods of mythological his-tory from around the world. “We like to think of our music as having a certain artistic quality which allows you to en-joy it in several different moods,” lead singer Adham Kafafy explained.

To the group, being identified as a cer-tain genre of metal could be mislead-ing. “Every genre in metal has in turn its own subgenre which in turn has its own subgenres,” Kafafy explained. The most common type of music in Egypt is oriental, which finds its way into every other genre. It is because of this that many bands have such strong oriental influences in their songs. To Kafafy, what makes a band ultimately good is the abil-ity to drift from one genre to another in order to find their influences and their own style. For an artist, the most pre-cious part of it all is the ability to enjoy and express yourself to the fullest of your abilities.

This is how Kafafy spoke of his mu-sic, referring to songs such as The Battle Within, a song that delves into the in-ternal struggle between good and evil. It is about that voice inside of you which always warns you when you go astray. “When you are faced with the choice; do you listen to it or do you turn your back to it?” Kafafy asked. The band is associated with what is known as pro-gressive metal, a genre filled with sto-rytelling.

Once their first album is released, An-archy will be working on their second album, which will feature more modern stories. “Perhaps it would be something political or something inside your own mind. It could be a location or an event,” but at this point they want to leave it a mystery.

“We have been playing the line-up of our first album for the past two years,” lead guitarist Ahmed Raouf said. It has given them the opportunity to fine-tune their music, producing a polished album the members can be proud of. “We only managed to start recording this year, so it is not a new release as much as it is bringing the show to the people through electronic and hard-copy distribution.” Raouf said the group had chosen to use

a six-string guitar for this album but will be focusing on the seven-string guitar for their next album.

Completing the band alongside Ka-fafy and Raouf are Peter Ayman on rhythm guitar, Hazem Sherif on bass and Naeyr Ossama on drums. What makes this line-up so unique is their refusal to recycle riffs, making every segment of the song a unique part of the music. These segments act like markers within the song, allowing you to place where along the track you are solely by listen-ing to the melody.

By definition, anarchy is not the pres-ence of chaos, but the absence of or-der. The word stems from the ancient Greek words of an and archos meaning to have no ruler. By disregarding the common rule of rhythm and repetition, Anarchy was born.

Glory, fame and fortune are certainly part of what makes being a musician at-tractive, yet Anarchy has remained level-headed over the years. Granted there is a severe shortage in rolling red carpets on the Hollywood-scale of things in Egypt, their fans nevertheless recognise them on the streets.

“You won’t find large groups of met-alheads gathered together outside of a concert setting,” Raouf said. “At most, there will be a handful of people because the community isn’t as established like those in Finland, New Zealand or the United States.”

“The good thing about it is that we are treated like normal people by our fans and that is also largely due to the fact that we share a special relationship with them,” Kafafy said. After a set the band is known for their personal approach, jumping into the crowd and spending time with fans. “We often go out for din-ner with them, or spend a night in their company,” Raouf explained. “Without our fans we are nothing.”

Wyvern – Breaking through the barriers

Growing up, the members of Wyvern were attracted to metal music due to its distinctive nature. The depth of the lyrics, the issues addressed by the songs, the prominent riffs and grooves, the compositions, the vocals, the guitar solos are all just a few of the reasons that drew them to heavy metal in a pop-dominated culture. The founding line-up, when Wyvern was formed in 2003, had Marawan Shaaban and Sherif Alaa on guitars, Hameed on bass and Seif El-Din Moussa on drums.

Starting as a cover band, Wyvern played songs from their favourite bands like Metallica, Megadeath, Iron Maiden and Sepultura. A year later, Wyvern performed their first single, Sex for Sale. The track criticised the state of the mainstream music scene, how it was overpowered with ob-scene, profit-oriented songs, which

lacked musicianship and songs revolv-ing around poorly handled issues that were usually performed by medio-cre musicians. Adham Roshdy joined Wyvern as their lead vocalist in 2006 when the band started shifting to-wards original material.

By the turn of the 21st century, metal concerts in Egypt attracted an audience of 800 to 1000 people at most. Wyvern’s performance at the SOS music festival was the first time a heavy metal band performed for a large audience since 1997; an audience of about 15,000 people. This performance was featured as a breakthrough for metal music in Egypt in a BBC coverage of the event. The band delivered their music to over 20,000 people at other instalments of the festival.

By 2008 the band recorded their first album titled The Clown. It was the first legally-licensed heavy/thrash metal album in Egypt. One of the ob-stacles the band faced while recording and releasing the album is that most of the audio engineers in Egypt lack relevant experience and knowledge about the genre’s sound. “I wasn’t in-volved in the recording process from the beginning”, said Essam Al-Saharty, audio engineer on The Clown. Wyvern asked Al-Saharty to join the team, in the middle of the recording process, and help them achieve a better produc-tion from the available recorded tracks. Al-Saharty said that due to the tight timeframe, he was forced to accept the recorded sessions the way they were, and that the sessions did not adhere to the desired standards of the genre. Before starting the recording process, Wyvern did not choose the relevant person for the job. “It’s not that the engineers are bad, it’s only that they do not understand the sound of metal and there was a lack of experience in the record-taking process,” Al-Saharty explained.

“Egypt is not a good market for heavy metal,” drummer Seif said, re-ferring to the obstacles a band faces. The members were oppressed along the years for trying to uphold metal music in Egypt. The group believed many people had placed little faith in their ability to succeed and singing in English would not make it easier for them to find a producer.

Wyvern’s line-up has significantly changed over time, “I lost count,” Seif said. In 2010, Sherif the guitarist was replaced by Mohamed “Ousso” Lotfy who performed with the band until halfway through this year. Hameed wanted to explore and engage in dif-ferent musical directions. Feeling that he would not be able to offer a great input to Wyvern, he decided to leave the band in 2011. “I received a phone call from Marawan asking me whether I wanted to join Wyvern or not, and my answer was an absolute yes,” said Osama Salah, Wyvern’s current bass-ist. Later in the year, Rami Sidky joined the band replacing Ousso, who had moved to England.

There are many reasons behind the changes in the band’s line-up. “Nothing that has to do with the relationships be-tween the band members though,” said Seif. Marawan believes that one of the reasons why members leave a band in general is frustration and despair. “They feel that the path they are following is not taking them anywhere,” Marawan said. He added however, that those who truly believe in what they are doing are still in the band.

Heavy metal tackles and addresses personal, psychological, social and philosophical issues. “We channel our frustration regarding troubling issues into music rather than other dysfunc-tional expressions,” said Marawan. For instance, Wyvern’s Dr Butcher attacks the brutality behind illegal organ trad-ing, while Fallen Idol tackles the issue of being deceived and disappointed by the very people we look up to.

The band shares a diverse pool of musical backgrounds, which results in the unique sound of their music. Wyvern is currently working on their second album, blending their different musical experiences towards a mod-ern-oriented sound, while maintaining the profound characteristics of old-school metal.

The band has turned their attention to finding a respectable international label under which they can further de-velop their talents and expose their mu-sic to the world. “The band has enough experience and repertoire to make that breakthrough, focusing on the creation of good music and going international will definitely work out,” said Ramy, Wyvern’s current guitarist.

Massive Scar Era – Challenging societal sensibilities since 2005

Defying virtually every concept of women in the predominantly conser-vative Egyptian society, Massive Scar Era (Mascara for short) began as an all-female, four-piece, face-melting band. In 2005, Sherine Amr lifted her guitar, and with a combination of talent and passion began to work on what was to become Mascara. Over the next year her dedication led her to find Nancy Mounir, the violinist that solidified their musical identity.

Over the next two years the group was frequently undergoing changes in the line-up, with Nancy and Sherine being the permanent members. Find-ing ways to fuse Sherine’s passion for punk and hardcore music and Nancy’s eloquent classical melody, the girls man-aged to draw the attention of several venues and events in their hometown of Alexandria, eventually being invited to play at the SOS music festival.

By 2009, Sherine and Nancy decided to take their act to Cairo, and due to the frequency of their line-up rotation and the talent pool available in Cairo, the girls decided to forego the notion of an all-female group and took on Youssef Altay as the drummer. In that year, the group was given their first international stage in Sweden, at the annual Sweden Rock Festival. The band performed alongside musical giants such as Motör-head and Immortal.

Calling the current line-up a metal band may be a mistake, as their effec-tive combination of thrash and classical melody leave many people surprised “We play post-melodic hardcore, which is a mix between the hard-core riffs and many other genres,” Sherine explained. “We often have a wide mix of pop, punk and oriental influences, along with both the screaming vocals and the melodic

soprano.”This musical smorgasbord was not

the end-goal Sherine had envisioned, saying the style had chosen them. Their current line-up consists of Sherine on vocals and guitar, Karim Ashraf on bass, Nancy and her violin and Maged Faltas on the drums. “I come from a punk and hardcore background,” Sherine explained. “Nancy comes from a very classical and oriental background, Karim comes from metalcore and Maged comes from a hardcore and blues back-ground.”

Being accepted in Egypt’s metal scene as a woman was very hard for Sherine, and having a female leading the group hasn’t made their job easier. “Most of the other bands did not take us seriously and did not really accept us,” Sherine said.

“The other bands began taking us seriously when we started touring outside of Egypt in 2009,” Sherine explained. Their performance in Swe-den was not merely as another band in a festival but as representatives of Egypt’s internationally untapped musi-cal market, the unelected spokesper-sons. “Many bands,” Sherine began, “were very excited for us but some bands got upset,” due to what they perceived to be an unfair advantage given to Mascara simply for having women in the group. “It is very stu-pid to be honest, but we have to deal with this kind of mentality in our soci-ety.” Driving the point home, Sherine pointed out that they are musicians and should not be valued according to their gender. “I choose to ignore those people and carry on with creat-ing music.”

Mosh-Pit Maniacs – Hijacking the airwaves one song at a time

Mosh-Pit Maniacs (MPM) may very well be the only metal radio station in Egypt, or at the very least the most well-known by some margin. It was launched in April 2011 through an online radio channel now known as capitalclubradio.com. The creator of MPM, Baron Daimonos as he is known in the scene, was offered to launch an online metal radio show by the owner of Capital Club Radio, Ossama Kamal.

“The main reason behind starting the show,” Daimonos explained, “was the lack of an on-air portal that reflects

our metal music scene in Egypt and the Middle East.” This new project allowed listeners to become familiar with new bands, expanding their libraries and pro-moting the art. His radio show allowed the listeners to “get to know more about bands they have been listening to and bands that they will listen to for the first time and throughout their musical life,” Daimonos said. “The show aims to upgrade listeners’ information levels when it comes to metal music and cer-tainly update their music libraries with everything that is new and good.”

Daimonos remembers his first hosting session very well, and re-called his enthusiasm in promoting all things metal. “I remember hosting the first two episodes with a message to familiarise non-metal music listen-ers with all heavy metal sub-genres, as one of the show’s messages is to familiarise non-metal music listeners with metal music’s tunes, philosophy and lifestyle in general.” Since its in-ception, Daimonos has interviewed several Egyptian bands, including Crescent, Black Rose and Sinproph-ecy. The plethora of genres and sub-genres ranging, “from heavy metal and the new wave of British heavy metal to the dark recesses of black metal,” Daimonos said, creates a near bot-tomless pool of styles and bands.

Egypt’s metal is in great part influ-enced by other musical genres, which have grown alongside Egypt’s culture such as oriental music, and it is in this unique aspect that Egypt is just like any other metal scene in the world. It has the devoted metalheads that go to as many concerts as they can, often travel-ling from city to city for separate con-certs. Daimonos points out that the metal scene is mostly concentrated in the large Egyptian cities of Alexandria and Cairo.

Metal will always exist in Egypt, Daimonos believes. Regardless of any political developments in the country he is confident that metalheads will still enjoy the music. It is from the musical side of things that raises concerns to Daimonos, who is adamant that the rel-atively low number of bands perform-ing in Egypt are often ill-suited in their attempts at generating music that can be bearable to listen to. “Old is gold,” Daimonos said, “and in Egypt this is of-ten the case.”

www.thedailynewsegypt.com

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012 Daily news egypt 7

in-Focus

Peter Ayman

The band pose for the camera after a set

Anarchy perform live on stage

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Rocking against the tide; a showcase of egypt’s metal mania

Egypt’s mEtal scEnE still rElativEly small but hErE to stay

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8 Daily news egypt TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012

art & CUltUre Art should make a statement and Culture is what surrounds us.

events

By Omar El Adl

The line between what we perceive with our senses to be the real world and the virtual world has become increasingly blurred. The idea of the world becom-ing a small village has already come and gone and today we face the realities of a post-globalised world. The internet as a virtual space dominates our physical space and coexists with it, always in in-teraction, whether in reality or in our imagination.

The interaction of both spaces and the borders between them, whether real or perceived, is what the latest exhibition at the Townhouse gallery explores. The exhibition, IRL, an inter-net acronym for “in real life”, features the work of four artists, three of whom have never shown their work in Egypt or the region.

The exhibition itself is of a kind rarely seen in Egypt, dealing with net-based works which one expects to see in the virtual world, and project-ing them onto the real world. Familiar images are disoriented and the pix-

els provide a hypnotic animation of something we disassociate with the virtual world and associate with the real one.

One of the artists, Islam Shabana, says for him the exhibition is about doubt. “We cannot be sure of what we are seeing, whether it is real or not. Even the image I used of nature looks as artificial...and who is to say that it is real or original and in what sense?”

Shabana’s piece consists of a fa-miliar screensaver of a tropical is-land with the water moving in a very artificial way among absolutely still, picture-perfect trees and sand that is projected on the wall. Also projected, but only slightly visible, is a jarring sec-ond image that can only be seen as one moves in front of the projector, revealing the interplay between the screensaver and the second image. Lastly, there is a generous amount of real sand on the floor, at the foot of the projection, sometimes giving the illusion that the sand in the picture and the sand on the floor are continu-ations of one another.

Shabana wants to question the idea of the borders between the physical and the virtual and even the notion of what is really true, independent of our senses. “When I turn away from you, you cease to exist visually so does that stop making you real in some sense to me? Perhaps it is like Plato’s cave and what we are seeing is only what we think to be reality and not actual reality.”

The exhibition has a mesmerising quality to it that captures our imagi-nation regarding what is real and what is virtual. It does not try to place the boundaries between both spaces but merely wants to explore them. Shabana says he is not here to say what the case is exactly. Rather, he is here to ask ques-tions, he says, of the audience. “I want them to doubt. It may or may not be one way or another but is important to pose questions about these concepts that are especially relevant today, and above all doubt.”

The IRL exhibition concludes tomorrow and the exhibition is open to everyone and is free to attend.

irl: townhouse’s exhibition wants people to doubt

Alexandria 27°C / 17°C

Aswan 36°C / 21°C

Cairo 29°C / 19°C

Hurghada 29°C / 22°C

Luxor 33°C / 20°C

Sharm El-Sheikh 33°C / 23°C

Suez 27°C / 16°C

WeatherTuesday, October 23

Mosireen’s campaign to remain open and independent through donations seems to have reached a worldwide audience as it makes the home page

of the famous torrent (file-sharing) website The Pirate Bay.

The website, which of course none of us use, put this picture on its home

page, featured prominently above its search bar, which then takes you to Mosireen’s page where a donation can easily be made.

The dark clouds have gathered in the skies above the capital. And this time we are not referring to the political climate, the stifling pollution or the general bad temper of the popula-tion stuck in traffic.

From one day to the next the smell of the air changes, and yes, it is possible to notice differences in the terribly polluted air of Cairo. Eyes start itching, an irritating dry cough

suddenly appears and the sunlight seems to be filtered through a soft grey haze.

The countless plans and initiatives to avoid the onslaught on our col-lective health apparently have been shelved for yet another year. It is that time of year again, when the fields are being prepared for the next growing cycle and the farmers burn the rice husks.

Hanaa Abdel-Fattah, an iconic fig-ure in theatre and culture in Egypt, passed away on Friday after a lengthy battle with cancer. The famous the-atre director and occasional actor was a well-respected figure both in his native Egypt as well as in Poland where he studied at the state Insti-tute of Theatrical Arts in Warsaw. His full name was Mohamed Hanaa Abdel-Fattah Metwaly, but he was best-known to audiences as Hanaa Abdel-Fattah. He spent years in the theatre in Poland and has translated key works from Polish to Arabic, in-cluding the herculean task of trans-lating the poetry of Nobel Laureate

Czesław Miłosz.After earning his PhD from War-

saw University, Abdel-Fattah re-turned to Cairo and taught at the city’s Higher Institute of Theatrical Arts.

The professor of theatre was among the foremost promoters of Polish culture in Egypt as well as be-ing a pioneer in the cultural dialogue of both countries. He translated and directed many Polish plays for the Egyptian stage and was honoured by both Poland and Egypt and given pres-tigious awards and medals for his con-tributions to culture in both countries. Abdel-Fattah was 68 years old.

Twice a year, on 22 February and 22 October, the face of the statue of King Rameses II inside the temple in Abu Simbel is lit up by the sun and dates coincide with his date of birth and his coronation respectively.

The temple, located deep in Up-per Egypt, was carved into rocks on the banks of the river Nile. After the completion of the Aswan dam the

temple and its unique feature of solar alignment would have flooded as the waters were rising so an archeological rescue mission in the form of moving the complete temple to higher ground was performed.

Seeing the magical moment when the sun lights up the statues of Rame-ses II, Amun-Ra and Ra-Horakhty draws large groups of tourists to the temple

twice per year. The fourth statue in the inner chamber depicts the god of the underworld, Ptah, and his face remains in darkness as the others light up.

The Google doodle today shows the moment that the sun shines on the faces of the statues, drawing the atten-tion of the world to this intriguing phe-nomena and highlighting the treasures that Egypt has to offer to its visitors.

a torrent of donations Dark cloud above Cairo

Prominent figure in egyptian theatre Hanaa Abdel-Fattah dies

abu simbel featured in the doodle of the day

Zen Beach by Islam Shabana

Google doodle of the sun shining inside Abu Simbel

Screengrab of The Pirate Bay website today

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Noam ChomskyOne of the world’s foremost linguists and philosophers will be speaking at the Ewart hall of AUC’s downtown campus. The MIT professor is more well-known to audiences outside academia for his political views and fittingly, he will be discussing the Arab Spring and an emerging world order. Be there very early.Ewart HallAmerican University in Cairo113 Kasr El Ainy StreetDowntown, CairoTel: (02) 2794 296423 October 7 pm

Music

Chikudo and FriendsEnjoy a piece of Japan and its music in all its glory at the Cairo Opera House’s small hall with Hogauku, a genre of music from 19th century Japan. Tickets are available from the ticket office.Cairo Opera HouseEl Borg GeziraZamalek, CairoTel: (02) 2739 011423 October 8 pm

Ahmed Nazmi and Basel RajoubMakan’s iconic and intimate loca-tion will host the very talented Ahmed Nazmi and Basel Rajoub for some jazzy tunes with an oriental and sufi flavor! Tickets are EGP 30 at the door, EGP 20 if you have a reservation.Makan1, Saad Zaghloul StreetDowntown, CairoTel: (02) 2792 087823 October 9 pm

The Ka-settes and Deja’vu A great night with the Ka-settes and Deja’vu where you will sing, dance, and possibly make a fool of yourself at the Cairo Jazz Club! Reservations are recom-mended.Cairo Jazz Club197, 26 of July Street Zamalek, CairoTel: (02) 3345 993923 October 10 pm

Michelle RoundsNo one does it better than Rounds with her unique voice and her mix of jazz and soul. Her lively performances will engage you in a great night that should be on your top list of events anyway.Jazz Bar Kempinski Nile Hotel 12 Ahmed Raghab StreetGarden City, CairoTel: (02) 2798 000023 October 10 pm

Ballet

Le CorsaireThe famous three act ballet loosely based on the even more famous poem by Lord Byron will be performed at the Cairo Opera House, giving you the chance to dress up in your finest and go enjoy a night of the finest in the French and the Russian ballet tradition. The matinee starts at 11 am while the soiree starts at 8 pm.Cairo Opera HouseEl Borg GeziraZamalek, CairoTel: (02) 2739 011423 October 11 am- 8 pm

FilM

Goethe’s 12th Independent Short Film FestivalCairo’s latest film festival has only been around for 12 years but cinephiles should still be on alert as the Goethe short film festival will showcase inde-pendent films that will not be screened anywhere else! Do not miss it!Goethe Institute5 El Bostan StreetDowntown, CairoTel: (02) 2575 987723 October 4 pm

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A satellite image of the cloud over Egypt

Hanaa Abdel-Fattah being honoured at the Polish embassy in Cairo