Thursday, September 13, 2007

Bad days for Press Freedom in Egypt

The Egyptian Independent Press is living its worst days nowadays .

First yesterday ,according to the General attorney the Chief in editor

of  daily Newspaper "El-Dostor" "Ibrahim Eissa" is going to stand in  front of the court next October for the Charge of

"Spreading rumors that affected the National security and Economy"

A charge that can send "Eissa" to Jail for complete four years !! Of course with threats to close the Independent successful newspaper

It was not enough for some as today the court ruled to send four chief in editors of four independent newspapers to jail for a complete year with a fine of 20,000 E.P ,if they want to appeal then they have to pay immediately 10,000 E.P !!

insulting President Mubarak ,his son and the NDP !!

Those four chief in editors are :

  • Ibrahim Eissa of Daily El-Dostor , again !!
  • Wael El-Ibrahasi of weekly Sawt El-Oma
  • Abd El-Halim Kandeel ,ex-chief in Editor of weekly El-Karma
  • Adel Hamouda of weekly El-Fagr

Both Daily El-Dostor and Sawt El-Oma are published by the same  Ibrahim Eissa independent publisher "Essam Fahmy" { The brother of our Current Ambassador to the U.S and the son of our late foreign minister Ismail Fahmy }

Both Newspapers are considered the best selling daily and weekly newspapers

El-Karma is the a weekly Nasserite newspaper published by the Nasserite party "El-Karma" headed by the MP "Hamdeen Sabhy "

El-Fagr is an independent newspaper published by business Man "Nassif Kazman" , "Gamal Marwan's" partner in Melody company

This came today , bad news in the first day of Ramadan , the blessing p13_20070517_pic3_preview of another black September , the autumn of anger has returned folks

It turned out that two NDP members had made a case in the court against the four chief in editors accusing them of the following :

  • Insulting the President of the State Hosni Mubarak and his son Gamal Mubarak
  • Attacking and spreading rumors about the National Democratic ruling party

I do not know but I feel the witch hunt against the free Press in Egypt began its season , just before the big changes in the NDP take place !!

This is not the first time El-Abrashi or Eissa to be accused and stand Hamouda in front of the court for that reason ,insulting the President

The new thing in the whole matter is including someone like Adel Hamouda ,whom I consider to be from the regime's men , the pseudo opposition like Mustafa Bakery

I am not surprised by the other three because of the following

- Abd El-Halim Kandeel is the spokesperson of Kafya , a Nasserite Abd El-Halim Kandeel and well known opposition figure to the regime , already that man from couple of years was abducted, was hit and was left totally naked in the middle of No where in the desert in Ramadan and till now those who did it were not arrested !! He is a very hardcore opposition figure , a serious one

-Wael El-Ibrahasi , he does not write in the same way like Kandeel or Eissa does , in a less attacking tune , but he exposed in his newspaper and his very successful popular weekly TV show the corruption and the scandals of the NDP members , well in my opinion he is much more dangerous to the NDP as he made it appear as one big gang of thieves , of course not to mention the four constant pages in the newspapers about the scandals of torture in the Egyptian police station

-Ibrahim Eissa , the biggest pain in the regime big a$$ , seriously Al-Abrashi is a diplomat in his writings ,Kandeel is an old fashion Nasserite in his writings where as this chubby man does not have boundaries to stop him for attacking Mubarak ,his sons and his wife , describing Mubarak as the Tyranny and the Moses' Pharaoh of his time ,attacking the government and the regime , exposing the plans of GM in the NDP

Eissa in his daily column almost everyday must attack Mubarak , in fact there is no day without attacking him and his regime whether in the daily or the weekly edition of El-Dostor on Wednesday where not only Mubarak is under fire ,but his regime and his men in the official media and that's why all the official media from TV and newspapers are very happy that he is going to be sent to jail

It is not the end for sure like some think , this is just the beginning , I have to go now because the IFtar is few minutes away

Wait for more coverage

I feel so angry, this is the first day of Ramadan

Updates: The Egyptian Journalists syndication issued an official statement I got it now

Of course it is in Arabic and I got no brain to translate except the bottom line

The Syndication is refusing this court order

They consider it as bad day for the Freedom of Press and Freedom of expression and they will not stand and do nothing , they will resist this aggression calling all those free people to stand beside them

There will be an emergency meeting for the council of the Syndication next Sunday the 16ht of September in Cairo to discuss the way they can fight back this court order

Well I know that if My grand dad were alive , he would be attending this meeting

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