President Mubarak's birthday provided a perfect opportunity for the nation to take stock, write Gamal Nkrumah and Mohamed El-Sayed President Hosni Mubarak's 80th birthday celebration preoccupied the press with official newspapers applauding Mubarak's achievements, but the opposition and independent press adopting a more critical tone. The official dailies Al-Ahramand Akhbar Al-Yom devoted their entire front pages to the subject, projecting colossal photographs of President Mubarak. In a flowery ovation, Al-Ahram's Editor-in-Chief Osama Saraya glorified Mubarak's birthday calling it "the day Egypt was born anew". He pronounced the president as "a political adjudicator equal to the United Nations." Editor-in-Chief of Akhbar Al-Yom Mumtaz El- Qott praised Mubarak in a full front-page article, "Why we love you, president". El-Qott extolled Mubarak in a language replete with approbation. "We love you President Mubarak because you are a virtuous leader who upholds and embodies the dignity and pride of your country and people." The daily opposition Al-Wafd, in sharp contrast, ran a headline following the announcement by President Mubarak last week that the government would increase salaries by 30 per cent. "The government is in a dilemma: it is trying to find LE6 billion to cover the salary raises announced by President Mubarak," the paper contended. The front-page headline stressed, "the raise is a political manoeuvre and is not sufficient to curb soaring [commodity] prices". The paper quoted Gouda Abdel-Khaleq, professor of economics at Cairo University as saying, "the government is not sincere about improving the incomes of [poor] people, since it failed to revise the minimum wage rateة the raise is nothing but a sedating solution." Meanwhile, official newspapers sang the praises of President Mubarak for two reasons: the 30 per cent rise in salaries and his birthday which falls on 4 May. Supporters of the president were unrestrained in their praise of the president's political legacy. Writing in the daily official Al-Gomhuriya, Mohamed Ali Ibrahim argued that, "President Mubarak represents the only hope for the poor by setting the rules that guarantee that the billions worth of [energy] subsidies wastefully spent on the rich be directed to the pockets of the poor." Writing in the daily Al-Masry Al-Yom, Amr Elshoubaki reflected on the government's reaction to the 6 April day of civil disobedience. "The biggest pessimist could not have imagined that the government would deal so harshly with those who advocated the virtual strike, which was embraced by websites, and the real strike that took place in Mahala Al-Kubraة" He added, "nobody also imagined that the Ministry of Interior would detain a young woman, Israa Abdel-Fattah, and her colleague, Nadia Mabrouk, in spite of the prosecutor-general's decision to release them, a matter that undermines the sovereignty of law." (Abdel-Fattah was detained by police for allegedly calling for the strike on the Internet). Elshoubaki argued that, "all the strikes that take place every day are staged to raise wages and set conditions of a category of professionals. When their demands are transformed into political ones, the [strikes] are disorganised and violent." Commenting on the same subject in the Arab Media Forum held in Dubai last week, Hani Shukrallah, executive director of the Heikal Foundation for Arab Journalism, was quoted in Al-Masry Al-Yom as saying: "It is noticeable that some Egyptian writers adopted a new way of thinking in the aftermath of the crisis which focussed on the dangers of the Internet on youth on the pretext that it contains pornography, as if the Internet didn't contain such contents before." Shukrallah was referring to articles written by pro- government editors and writers slamming the Internet and Facebook which is believed to be behind 6 April. Meanwhile, Hamdi Rizk, writing in Al-Masry Al-Yom, warned of the threat chatting websites poses to the sanctity of the Arabic language. "The language of chatting is gradually undermining the Arabic language, since the letters of the Arabic language are eroding in the same way the hieroglyphic language was restricted to temples, after which the Coptic language withdrew into churches." Rizk added, "those who are obsessed with chatting invented their own language that is used in instant messaging. This language was primarily invented when keyboards lacked Arabic letters, so they wrote Arabic sentences with English letters. And this language has become very easy for those who are used to it." Writing in the daily business-oriented Al-Mal, Hazem Sherif tried to analyse the current dispute between a multinational company, E Agrium, and the people of Damietta over the building of a LE10 billion fertiliser plant in the resort city of Ras Al-Bar which is widely believed to be a threat to the surrounding environment. The case has been the talk of the media over the past month. "I am not with or against the Canadian company E Agrium, whose case was much publicised recently because of its battle to build a fertiliser plant in the [resort] of Ras Al-Bar. However, the entire case casts doubts on the investment and business atmosphere in Egypt." Writing in Al-Masry Al-Yom, Tarek Abbas harshly criticised the presidential decree by virtue of which two new governorates were created, and which was amended later. "Is it plausible that some people in Giza go to sleep believing they are residents of Giza governorate, and then wake up to find themselves residents of Fayoum governorate, then sleep and wake up to find themselves belonging to the new Sixth of October governorate? How can we talk about [good] planning while we are witnessing the most astonishingly haphazard [in taking vital decisions]?" Abbas added, "the creation of the two governorates without headquarters, without capitals, without security departmentsة will put the government in a difficult position since how will it be able to provide the resources required for the two new governorates? This is one of the unbelievable things that emphasise the fact that Egypt under the existing regime has become the country of wonders." This view was echoed by Osama Heikal in the same paper which criticised the decision for economic reasons. "This decision was taken after the 2008-2009 state budget was already prepared and there is an estimated LE84 billion deficit in it. And when we add the cost of creating those two governorates, this deficit will definitely rise by several billions of pounds." He argued, "this odd decision represents a new crisis to be added to an Egyptian record replete with crises that arose because of such wrong decisions. This is also an example of how decision-making in Egypt has been made in recent years." Writing in Al-Ahram, Ragab El-Banna tried to answer the perplexing question, "Why Muslims are backward?" He argued that, "authoritarian regimes in the Arab world have used Islam as a weapon to protect their corruption and as a tool to persuade Muslim nations to reject modern civilisation on the pretext that it is degenerate, immoral, unethical and atheist. These regimes also [promoted the notion that] rejecting modern civilisation is an expression of defending the Islamic identity and national dignity." The writer did not exempt Western powers from their responsibility for the backwardness of Muslims. "Also, as the West tightened its grip on the Islamic world, it imposed ignorance, corruption, backward ideas, and a sense of suppression." The issue of succession received some attention in the press. The supreme guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohamed Mahdi Akef, was quoted in Al-Masry Al-Yom as saying his movement "categorically rejects the candidacy of Gamal Mubarak to the presidency". The rejection, apparently, is believed to be in response to the harsh sentences senior members of the banned group received few weeks ago from a military court.
