By Mohamed Selim “Germany’s government believes that Egypt ought to maintain the basic values of human rights for all its citizens, engage in a dialogue with all the opposing political factions and respect the religious freedoms of all Egyptians.” Those were the words of Germany’s Chancellor, Angela Merkel, in her 30 January 2013 presser with …
By Mohamed Selim On Monday, 23 February 2004, and at a tempestuous conference held at the headquarter of Egypt’s Syndicate of Journalists in downtown Cairo, former president Hosni Mubarak’s longtime loyalist and propaganda apparatchik, Safwat El-Sherif, declared that he would be the country’s last minister of information (a post that he had held for 22-years). …
By Mohamed Selim During the two past weeks, Egypt was gripped by yet another case of media sciolism. Al Kahera Wal Nas, “Cairo and the People”, a private satellite channel broadcasted from Cairo’s Media Production City (MPC), has been the subject of controversy in a dangerously polarised country. Its programme, The Black Box, presented by a …
Egypt’s media have been in campaign mode leading up to Monday and Tuesday’s vote. Official, quasi-official and the social media are dedicating their undivided attention to the presidential elections with reports, interviews and analyses that tackle the two candidates’ platforms, credentials and implausible promises. Yet, an Egyptian Nobel laureate and former presidential hopeful, who, respect …
By Mohamed Selim On 3 July 2013, as then General, now Field Marshal, Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi announced the ouster of former President Mohamed Morsi, millions of Egyptians cheered, while others jeered, as they received that expected ruse by Egypt’s most powerful establishment. Nine months after that annunciation, is Egypt better off? The answer is no. …
By Mohamed Selim The first step that any country on the verge of collapse should do, is to empower its institutions, including its fourth estate without which, all efforts to garner the public’s confidence would be an exercise in futility. A few weeks ago, Egypt’s newly appointed interim Prime Minister Ibrahim Mehleb, maintained the mandate …
By Mohamed Selim If I had my druthers, the first thing I would have done on the evening of 11 February 2011, would be to restructure and regulate Egypt’s media. Its current state of discord, lawlessness and entropy is tantamount to the country’s evolving political system: mobocracy. As Egypt’s former chief spy, the late Omar …
