CAIRO - The first wall emerged last November in the aftermath of violent clashes between security forces and protesters close to the headquarters of the Interior Ministry near Tahrir Square. More were soon constructed near the Parliament and Cabinet buildings, also very near Tahrir Square, following deadly clashes between soldiers and anti-military protesters. The number of the walls has now reached six. Five months on, they are still there, adding to traffic jams in central Cairo. They are eyesores too. There is no good reason why these walls are being kept. The people who reside or work in this area complain about the trouble they have to go to every day to get to work and back. The authorities' silence about these dividing barriers gives the impression that they take them for granted, regardless of their ugliness and the fact that they curb the public's freedom of movement. If the Government is concerned about protecting key State institutions such as the Interior Ministry and Parliament, it could always relocate them to the outskirts of the capital, where there is oodles of space. In so doing, it would be killing two birds with one stone, as such a move would also remove a chronic reason for traffic congestion in this area, located in the vicinity of the National Museum. Many Egyptians cannot help but compare the concrete walls dividing Qasr Al-Aini Street in central Cairo to the serpentine separation wall set up by Israel in the West Bank. "Every morning, I ride a microbus from Maadi [in southern Cairo] to my work in the Mugamaa [the huge administrative building in Tahrir]," says Hassan el-Meleegi. "Because of these walls, I have to get off beside the Nile then walk for almost 15 minutes. "Whose smart idea was it to build these walls? With such geniuses around, I'm afraid I'll wake up one day to discover that my wife has also set up a separation wall inside our house to prevent the heated arguments between us," el-Meleegi, a 57-year-old diabetic, adds sarcastically. Street artists have been protesting against these walls in their own way, painting images on these drab structures to give the impression of unbridled openness. "We want to send a message to the rulers that the Egyptian revolution [that deposed Mubarak] was staged to remove barriers," says Salma el-Tarzi, a documentary director. El-Tarzi is behind an initiative entitled ‘No to Walls'. "Building [dividing] walls is repressive," she adds.
