CAIRO: A Cairo Court ruled on Dec. 27 to end the 15-year-long receivership over the Engineers' Syndicate. The Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights, which had filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Engineers Against Receivership, a group formed to end government control over the syndicate, celebrated the verdict. The North Cairo Primary Cassation Court issued a verdict in the suit no. 6263 of 2009, which called for lifting of the receivership of engineers' syndicate which has been imposed since April 22, 1995. During a press conference on Monday, Khaled Ali Omar, the executive director of the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights, explained that the government had imposed this judiciary guardianship on the syndicate "due to the omnipresence of the Muslim Brotherhood within the executive positions of the syndicate. This year, the center argued to the court that the decision taken at that time was a temporary one to end a conflict within a syndicate. "With this verdict, engineers can have their elections and can organize general assembly for the syndicate, said Khaled Ali Omar, the executive director of the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights, during a Dec. 28 press conference. The government can appeal this preliminary verdict, but if it did, Omar said, it would be taking a step towards ending the important roles played by syndicates in Egypt. "Engineers experienced the drawbacks of not having their own syndicate sovereignty, which is what pushed them to fight for their rights, Omar said. In 2004, a group of engineers formed Engineers Against Receivership. After the government refused to implement a court order granting engineers the right to hold syndicate elections, the group delegated the center to file the lawsuit in June 2009.
