Politics and business are mixing in ways that are becoming increasingly suspect. Gamal Essam El-Din investigates Three recent high-profile corruption cases have shed light on what seems to be an increasingly cozy relationship between businessmen and politicians in Egypt. Illegal deals involving members of parliament and businessmen doing favours for each other have moved from behind the scenes to the spotlight of the courtroom. One of the most prominent of these cases involves Abdullah Tayel, the ex-chairman of Misr Exterior Bank, who will soon be standing trial at the Supreme State Security Court on several corruption charges. Tayel, who has been in custody for four months now, is accused of misappropriating around LE260 million of his bank's funds in return for hefty commissions, as well as providing several businessmen with millions of pounds in loans without receiving adequate collateral. Tayel, an MP and the former chairman of parliament's economic affairs committee, is the prime suspect among 18 defendants, including four senior Misr Exterior Bank officials, 11 businessmen, two accountants and an engineer. Seven of the defendants are in custody, three have been released on LE20,000 bail each, and eight are on the run. The business tycoons on trial include steel magnate millionaires Abdel-Wahab Qouta, a Port Said MP, Tayseer El-Hawari and Mohamed El-Garhi. Qouta and El-Hawari's sons are also implicated in the case. Tayel, however, is the focal point of the case, for he seems to have gone out of his way to facilitate access to bank funds to the 11 businessmen on trial with him. A case in point is when Tayel instructed the bank's Mohandessin branch to provide El-Hawari with LE2.9 million in cash loans, despite the fact that the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) had already instructed banks to deny loan requests for anyone from the El-Hawari family because they were "financially bankrupt". According to the prosecution, Tayel also provided $21 million in loans at a falsified dollar/pound exchange rate to five of the businessmen on trial with him. Apparently, Tayel later tried to cover up this impropriety by forging official bank documents. The case is especially significant because both Tayel and Qouta are prominent MPs and heavyweight members of the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP). A close associate of NDP parliamentary whip and Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Kamal El-Shazli, Tayel managed to become chairman of parliament's economic affairs committee just two years after first being elected to the assembly in 1995. Tayel's rise to prominence was so rapid that by November 2001, it was suggested that he take over the chairmanship of the CBE. Qouta's parliamentary life, meanwhile, began way back in 1968. In 1996, reportedly with the support of El-Shazli, Qouta became the economic affairs committee's deputy chairman. Tayel and Qouta, however, are not the first economic affairs committee members to face the music for alleged corruption. In the outgoing assembly (1995-2000), four of the committee's MPs were stripped of their membership after the courts found them guilty of a plethora of shady practices. At a press conference last week, Prosecutor-General Maher Abdel-Wahed said the Misr Exterior Bank case proves that "no one is above the law and that the prosecution will not... tolerate officials using their public posts to attain personal gains." Several opposition MPs have reacted to corruption cases like the one involving Tayel by posing embarrassing questions to Prime Minister Atef Ebeid about "the political responsibility of cabinet ministers for the proliferation of corruption in their sector". Many of the defendants in these cases, MPs claimed, were close associates of at least three cabinet ministers. Several NDP MPs also complained that the insistence of their party's senior officials on appointing businessmen as chairmen of parliament's economic and budget committees runs counter to principles of transparency and the separation of business and politics. The prime minister seemed to agree with the opposition MPs on one aspect of the cases at least -- that they were bad for business. According to Ebeid, the government must watch its steps, especially in a globalised world where international investors need to be wooed. "Our battle against corruption is serious and genuine," Ebeid has said. "Our slogan is that no one is above the law."
