Protests and sit-ins in front of parliament have been banned by security forces, reports Gamal Essam El-Din The two-week sit-in organised by workers of Amonsito -- a private spinning and weaving company in the industrial city of 10 Ramadan -- in front of the People's Assembly and Shura Council, degenerated into a violent clash with central security forces on Sunday. Amonsito workers, half-naked and beating drums, tried to climb the concrete and steel walls of the People's Assembly after a meeting held by parliament's Manpower Committee failed to defuse the dispute. They embarked on a street protest that took them to the headquarters of Bank Misr in Mohamed Farid Street, chanting slogans against Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif, Minister of Manpower Aisha Abdel-Hadi and Hussein Megawer, the chairman of the Manpower Committee and the General Federation of Egyptian Trade Unions (GFETU). Central security forces intervened, using force to prevent the workers from completing their march. According to security sources, 13 Amonsito workers were arrested. The protesters had pinned high hopes that Sunday's meeting of the Manpower Committee would find a solution to the dispute. According to Megawer, the meeting, attended by representatives of Amonsito workers, had reached a "satisfactory agreement" with Bank Misr officials. "Under the deal Bank Misr had offered LE50 million, and the government an additional LE10 million, to settle the payment of early retirement pensions for the workers employed by Amonsito company," said Megawer, allowing Bank Misr to then liquidate the assets of Amonsito. But representatives of Amonsito's workers objected to the deal, arguing that they were looking for a lump sum settlement of LE106 million. "LE60 million means that each Amonsito worker will be entitled to just LE60,000," an Amonsito workers' representative said. Minister of Manpower Aisha Abdel-Hadi defended the deal as "the best available under the circumstances". "The government," she said, "has nothing to do with Amonsito. It is a private company whose owner -- Syrian businessman Adel Agha -- has escaped the country, leaving Amonsito bogged down with debts and financial problems." She argued that, "a pension of LE60,000 for each Amonsito worker could be short of what they expected but it is the only available solution and workers should accept it rather than continue their sit-in in front of parliament." Abdel-Hadi's words angered representatives of Amonsito's workers, who threatened to escalate their sit-in into a hunger strike. The security forces reacted to Amonsito's threats by implementing an end to all protests in front of parliamentary buildings, including the demonstration by members of the board of the Syndicate of the Commercial Workers, again over pension payments, and by handicapped people petitioning Cairo governorate to allocate apartments for them. In a press interview last week, Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif said the government had ordered security forces to deal leniently with sit-in workers demonstrating in front of parliament. "This is part of our growing democracy," said Nazif. It did not, however, prevent police forces from using bludgeons to disperse the Amonsito workers. The growing number of demonstrations, street protests and sit-ins in front of parliament had led some political observers to call the pavement in front of the People's Assembly Egypt's Hyde Park. Nazif had insisted that, "the government would allow sit-ins and street protests in front of parliament as long as they remain peaceful". The violent protests of Amonsito workers and the harsh reaction of security forces on Sunday could signal that the gates of Egypt's Hyde Park are being shut till further notice.
