IN its verdict issued last week of annulling the privatisation contract of Shebin el-Kom Textile Company, the Supreme Administrative Court made it clear that Egypt, which joined the UN Treaty for Combating Corruption in 2004, is obliged to cancel any contract tainted with corruption. This means that Shebin el-Kom company will not be the last plaintiff in the courts of the innumerable factories and companies privatised by Mubarak's regime from the 1990s until the January revolution. Evidently, the Egyptian workers who suffered real injustice under this privatisation programme will start bringing more cases for restoring public property to the many companies and factories sold to foreign investors at trivial prices below the actual value of these producing institutions and their assets. In other word, there is an expected reverse of the privatisation process that would end these suspect contracts made between corrupt governmental officials of Mubarak's regime and foreign and local investors. The question is, will the present government and the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) regime accept this shift in the economic status of Egypt from capitalism and the market economy to a socialist one with the state running and owning many producing factories? The answer surely depends on two factors: the economic culture of the MB, which seems to tilt towards capitalism, and the endorsed constitution that adopts capitalistic policy, especially in respect of workers' wages being connected to production rather than prices. Most importantly here are the International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditions for offering Egypt a $4.8 billion loan that would not accept the state running these factories, especially given that the privatisation programme was an IMF and World Bank requisite for Egypt in reforming its economy in the 1990s. Does this mean that the state would stand against such court rulings the workers continue to gain in the interests of returning their factories to state ownership therefore return to work and resuming their former privileges before having their factories taken over by some foreign or multi-national companies? Apparently the answer is ‘yes,' as the government intended to appeal against all the rulings issued by the courts, annulling the privatisation contracts of some companies, including that of Shebin el-Kom. In September 2011, an Egyptian court cancelled the privatisation deal of three previously public-sector companies and ordered them to be returned to the government. They included Shebin El-Kom Textile Company, Tanta Company for Linen and Derivatives and the Steam Boilers' Company. However, the final verdict made by the Supreme Administrative Court settled the cause in favour of the workers. The problem is that the government has continued to refuse to enforce it, as was the case with the Steam Boilers' Company, whose workers found no other way, but to seize their closed company and re-set its name on the placard announcing its restoration. However, this will not mean the immediate re-operation of this significant factory. This leads us to contemplate the possible eruption of a revolution led, this time, by the Egyptian workers, a large proportion of whom were forced, by the new owners, to seek early pension, while others continued working under harsh conditions. Additionally, some foreign owners attempted to resort to foreign workers to replace the local workforce. Those workers would be encouraged by the previous court rulings to bring more lawsuits for retrieving many other factories and companies that were privatised during the last two decades of the corrupt regime of Mubarak. What would also encourage them is having the former presidential candidate and lawyer Khaled Ali on their side. It is no secret that Ali led this current of bringing cases to reverse the privatisation of these factories. Ironically, this is happening while the MB government and party are busy making reconciliation deals with corrupt officials and businesspeople of Mubarak's era to end bringing lawsuits against them in return for their repaying their ill-gotten gains! So what would this lead us to, if not a conflict between the workers' interest and the state vision under the rule of the MB?! What would make this concern reach the level of a revolution is the public support the workers would gain in this conflict, especially with the public opposition and suspicion of the so-called Islamic Sukuk (bonds). This would entail selling some of the state assets and institutions to any comer, whether Egyptian or not, which has made Al-Azhar reject the proposal as harming the national interest and therefore violating the Islamic Shari'a (religious law). Thus at a time when the MB is busily confronting the judiciary, the political civil powers and media people that challenge their rule, they would find the fiercest revolt coming from the direction of the workers. So, it is time to get ready for it, especially that Qandil Government does not seem to supporting the workers' aspirations to limiting the private ownership. For reviving the stalled economy, it is not wise to put all our hope in attracting foreign and Arab investments to create factories in Egypt and neglect re-operating the giant producing companies re-possessed by the state. If the government insists on rejecting the old public sector administration of these companies and factories, they could consider submitting around 49 per cent of its shares for selling to the Egyptians, especially the workers, that is to turn them into joint stock companies. Senior Judge Hisham Bastawisi, the former presidential candidate, suggested turning part of the incentives and interests being paid to the workers of any public sector factory to shares in these factories on the condition that they do not sell them to others for some 10 years. With this suggestion, Bastawisi intended to ensure steady revenues of these shares to the workers while enhancing their ownership of their factories, encouraging them to exert all efforts to increase production of these factories, which would benefit the national economy's revenues as well as the workers'. It is true that neither Bastawisi nor Ali won the presidential elections, but President Morsi could still profit from their ideas and programmes that would boost the economy and at the same time achieve social justice, one of the main goals of January 25 Revolution.
