CAIRO - The residents of the Greater Cairo governorates in particular are being subjected to a spate of stolen cars, reflecting the weak and ineffective security presence on the street that Egyptians in general are suffering from. Since the ousting of president Hosni Mubarak on February 11, thugs and thieves have benefited from the security vacuum and escalated their crimes. Statistics reveal that about 3,181 cars have been stolen during the past two months in the Greater Cairo governorates, which include 1,827 cars in Cairo Governorate alone. Police have returned only 390 cars to their owners. “While I was passing through the Taqa Street in the Nasr City district, three thugs forcibly stole my car,” Mohamed Abul Makarem, a Nasr City resident, complained. Another Cairo resident, Kamal Farouq, said, “After I entered into Tersana Club in Mohandiseen district, a thief stole my private car and left another stolen car instead of mine!” “The stolen cars rates have increased by 42 per cent compared to the same two months last year,” the Arabic-language Al-Gomhuria newspaper quoted Egypt's National Centre for Social and Criminology Research as stating in a report. “The incidents of theft are repeatedly occurring in front of owners' residences,” added the recently issued report. The auto thieves dismantle the cars and sell the used spare parts to workshops. “There is a mafia that specialises in stealing and dismantling the autos, focussing on recent models and expensive cars,” according to Ali Abou Dooma, a broker of selling and altering autos. “The specialist technicians change the cars' appearance. Then, some of auto thieves transfer the stolen cars to the remote, rural areas or the countryside. They sometime smuggle the spare parts to the occupied Palestinian territories across the Sinai Peninsula,” he added. “But the dismantling process is very difficult. The recent model cars need high levels of dismantling techniques,” Hassan Abdel-Latif, a trader and importer, told Al-Gomhuria. In turn, the traders of spare car parts spread throughout the Great Cairo governorates deny any charges of supporting and helping the auto thieves. “We usually import the spare parts of cars. The importers have legal licences and taxes' files. The wholesalers have the formal, legal documents of the spare parts possessed,” declared Aziz Moussa, a spare parts trader at Shalabi Village, Mostorud district affiliated to Qaluibiya Governorate. “The owners of newly constructed buildings are supposed to construct a garage below every building. These garages will protect the private cars, belonged to the buildings' inhabitants, from theft,” General Serag Zaghloul, a former Ministry of Interior aide observed.
