To subsidise or not to subsidise? That is the 64,465 billion pound question, which is the annual cost of the government's programme of subsidies. Subsidies on basic food items and fuel alone cost a total of LE46 billion, almost two-thirds of the country's subsidy budget, and these subsidies directly impact the daily lives of the vast majority of Egypt's 75-million-strong population. How long such subsidies will last, however, remains to be seen. Nine months after the country's constitution was amended to remove -- among other things -- the references to socialism that characterised Egypt's republican identity following the 1952 Revolution, the government is wasting no time in proving how un-socialist it has since become. Suddenly, we are faced with a deluge of statements and counterstatements on whether or not state subsidies on basic consumer goods and fuel will be removed, or, to use the politically correct term, "rationalised". The first reference to this issue was made in President Hosni Mubarak's speech opening the current parliamentary session on 14 November, in which he said that the subsidy programme should be "regulated" in order to guarantee that subsidies reach the people who need them most. This was followed by official announcements that the programme would be reviewed. In response to public concern and alarmist stories in the independent press, Mubarak then announced that "the state is committed to subsidising basic commodities" and that there would be no increases in the price of bread or energy. Confused by what "energy" includes, the press then fell prey to a guessing game, particularly since electricity prices had then just gone up. Could the president's statements mean fuel, many papers wondered. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif announced the government's plans to develop a new capital city, plans that were just as soon dismissed by Mubarak who said that the welfare of the country's poor people, not a new capital, was the state's priority. However, debate on the fate of the subsidies programme still rumbled on, stoked by Nazif's announcement that the government intended to replace the current system of subsidies with a welfare programme paying cash directly to the needy. These statements caused such an uproar that the prime minister was obliged to assure the editors of the national, opposition and independent press on Monday that the system of subsidies would stay. What the government intends, he said, is to try to find a way to ensure that subsidies go to those who need them most. There was no conflict on this issue between the government and the president, he said. Nevertheless, it is unlikely that the needy have received Nazif's message. The public's confidence in the government has been shaky for some time, and if the current wave of strikes among workers and now civil servants is anything to go by, this confidence is fast diminishing. According to official figures, prices have recently gone up by approximately eight per cent, while wages have gone down following the devaluation of the currency. If government employees, workers, university professors and doctors are now striking on an almost daily basis, demanding better pay and promised bonuses, then this can only mean that the government is even less able to provide genuine assistance for the most needy. The strikes are a powerful indication that the government is either incapable or uninterested in assisting either the poor, or the shrinking middle class for that matter. The question now is: in the absence of any real communication between the government and the poor, where is Egypt heading?
