Workers at a majority of Telecom Egypt's telephone exchanges nationwide began an open-ended strike on Sunday, demanding the removal of the company's CEO and the release of four colleagues detained by authorities. The strike included several major phone centers, such as those in the Dokki, Ramses and Opera neighborhoods, as well as in Giza, Alexandria, Port Said, Minya, Assiut and Sohag. But the company, which is Egypt's sole landline telephone service provider, said in a statement on Sunday that service has not been affected by the protests. Last week, workers at the state-owned company staged separate protests demanding the total removal of their managing board. The workers accuse CEO Mohamed Abdel Rahim of corruption and affiliation with the disbanded, previously-ruling National Democratic Party. They are also demanding investigations into corruption at the company. The protesting employees said they created several Facebook pages to communicate with each other, stressing that they will proceed with their strike until their demands are met. The protests escalated last week when number of employees held Abdel Rahim hostage at an office in the Opera telephone center for hours before special security forces freed him and arrested five employees. On Sunday, the public prosecution extended the detention of the five workers for another 15 days for investigation, in light of Abdel Rahim accusing them of attempting to kill him. Reports by the government's Central Auditing Organization have detected several breaches related to the bonuses disbursed to top officials, as well as other violations. Translated from the Arabic Edition
