Analysts feared the fallout from the US economic meltdown, write Gamal Nkrumah and Mohamed El-Sayed No quick fix Presidential pardoning, lamenting the erosion of state predominance in national affairs and a general sense of disgruntlement set the tone Pundits presume that Egypt is not quite at its best. The economy is rather shaky especially in light of the world economic crisis. But, there is more to be said, on a wider front, about the question of the state of affairs in the country. Filled with poignant meditation, pundits are pondering the future of the country. Others hearken back to the past. There is nostalgia for days bygone, when the affairs of the state were presumably conducted on a much better basis. Veteran analyst Mohamed Hassanein Heikal was quoted in the weekly issue of Al-Dostour as lamenting the end of the post-23 July 1952 Revolution Egyptian state which had a firm grip over affairs of government, industry and other sectors. There was a welfare system that greatly benefited the public and people had faith in the state. "I feel sad because the latest series of crises that have afflicted Egypt signals the disappearance of the state and the evaporation of the government," Heikal was quoted as saying. Heikal also reflected on the state of affairs in the Egyptian press, again bemoaning the state of affairs with regards to the Egyptian media. "The making of news in Egypt has become a real problem facing the press, for Egypt is no longer a major newsmaker." He derided the curious interest by tycoons in infiltrating the media and setting up their own news outlets, largely for propaganda purposes and self-aggrandisement. "There is a prevailing trend among businessmen, or those who call themselves so, to issue or own a newspaper. And those who have newspapers also want to own [satellite] TV channels... and this will have many ramifications. Their aim is to have venues which will defend them, promote their thoughts, and to submit to society what they want to do." Self-aggrandisement is, according to the commentators, the leading sin of the new breed of tycoons. However, far from this being the exclusive preserve of the super-rich, self-promotion in the most vulgar fashion has become a favourite pastime of newspapermen. Pundits were also intrigued by the new phenomena of piracy and hijacking. The Egyptian public had long heard of the kidnapping of Westerners in countries such as Yemen, but it is something of a novelty for Westerners to be kidnapped on Egyptian soil. Writing in the daily liberal-leaning Nahdet Masr, Mohamed Qadri Said reflected on the two incidents of kidnapping tourists and Egyptian citizens in the Western Desert by Chadian gunmen and the hijacking of an Egyptian fishing boat in the Gulf of Eden by Somali pirates. "The two incidents signal the absence of the government and the non existence of its influence and control in some areas that are far removed from the capital." Said added that the remoteness of the region in which Western tourists were kidnapped and the almost complete absence of government authority in that area increased the risk of kidnapping and lack of security in general. "In light of the government absence from these areas, highway robbers committed their crimes, which embarrassed the government locally and abroad," he concluded. The deplorable state of the world economy concerned many commentators. Writing in the daily independent Al-Masry Al-Yom, former head of the General Investment Authority Ziyad Bahaaeddin blamed the global financial crisis on "monitoring bodies which failed to scrutinise financial markets and ignored danger signals". Trying to diagnose the reasons that led to the crisis, Bahaaeddin argued that "the easiness of offering a loan with low interest rates" exacerbated the problem. He also noted that "the eagerness of financial institutions to expand in giving such loans even to those who are not able to repay them were behind the current tragic situation." He added, "the greediness of those working in financial markets is not the reason behind the crisis. It's the non existence of [good] monitoring." Bahaaeddin also tried to offer solutions to the current financial crisis noting that current practices are futile and inadequate. "The solution does not lie in limiting mortgages, as it is the most important type of financing... but it should be totally revised," Bahaaeddin summed up. He warned that if urgent steps were not implemented, the situation would continue to deteriorate at an alarming rate. And, while the global economy teeters on the edge of a bottomless precipice, the mismanagement of the Egyptian economy received ample attention from the pundits. Writing in Al-Masry Al-Yom, Hassan Nafaa called for the formation of a "national salvation government" to save Egypt from the bottom lows it has reached. "The formation of a national rescue government with certain guarantees and conditions depends on to what extent President Mubarak views the seriousness of the current state of affairs and his conviction that there is a need for a rescue operation," Nafaa argued. However, the writer did not pin much hope on President Mubarak's acceptance of the idea of forming such a government. "From our knowledge of President Mubarak's way of ruling for almost one- third of a century, the possibility that he will refuse such an idea is pretty high." In a most provocative column in Al-Masry Al-Yom, Abdel-Moneim Said, head of the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies, wondered how long Egyptians would suffer in silence as their standard of living deteriorates sharply. In the poignantly-entitled "Awaiting the Deluge" Said rhetorically asked: "Why don't Egyptians revolt? Why don't they express anger at their deplorable conditions of living? The key issue is that the most influential section of Egyptian society is well-off, at least reasonably so. Moreover, the lesser privileged do not know if they will fare better if and when a revolution erupts. "According to the Gini Coefficient, economic conditions in Egypt are not that bad... far better than Brazil, China, Malaysia, Russia, Turkey, Mexico and even the United States," Said noted. He concluded, however, that we, in Egypt, are still waiting for the revolution. Jewellers in Egypt are apparently having a field day. Women, in particular, are resorting to investing in gold for fear of the financial crisis. The daily official Al-Ahram ran a feature about the gold market in Egypt. "Housewives are capitalising on the swinging price of gold and by trading in it. They are listening to the speculations of gold traders arguing that the price of gold will skyrocket because of the decline in the value of the US dollar and oil."
