By: Dr. A. Dawabah and MEO Editorial Board
– One year has passed since Egypt Economic Development Conference (EEDC) was held in Sharm El-Sheikh during the period from March 13 to 15, 2015. The conference had witnessed participation of 89 countries, including 40 countries represented by their ambassadors, by 45%. Some 58 participating countries were poorer than Egypt, including 10 of the poorest countries in the world, by 65%. The conference attendees numbered 1,500 people, where the Middle East and North Africa region came at the top with regard to the representation rate. Egypt occupied the first position in terms of the number of delegates, reaching 414 representatives, by 41% of the total participants. The UAE came in the second position with 141 participants, by 14% of the number of attendees. Some 57 participants came from Saudi Arabia, by 6% of the attendees and then Kuwait, which was represented by 42 participants, by 4%. The United States and China were at the top of participants from outside the Middle East and North Africa region, with 44 and 45 participants respectively. Some 33 participants came from Italy, and 20 participants from the United Kingdom. About 6.14% of the attendees represented the financial and funding activities while 9.12% represented the construction sector. The energy sector was represented by 11.6%, the industrial sector by 6.6%. However, 9.10% of the participants belonged to unidentified sectors.
The EEDC was highlighted through a huge media campaign, assumed by the organizing company, i.e. Richard Attias & Associates (RAA), a global strategic consulting firm run by Richard Attias, the man who founded the annual World Economic Forum in Davos. RAA shares its London headquarters with Global Counsel, a strategic advisory firm run by Lord Peter Mandelson, the Labour Party peer and former business secretary. Mandelson publicly defended and praised Gamal Mubarak as a “leading reformer” at the outbreak of the Egyptian January Revolution in 2011. Peter Mandelson is also the Chairman of the international arm of Lazard, the Jewish US financial services company, which offers consultations on economic policies to Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi. Both RAA and Global Counsel are affiliates of WPP, the world leader in communications services. Sir Martin Sorrel, one of the keynote speakers at the EEDC, is the WPP Chief Executive. Also, Tony Blair was one of the prominent speakers at the EEDC. It is noteworthy that the Guardian revealed last year that Blair works as Sisi’s advisor, as part of the consulting program, financed by the UAE.
Within this huge media campaign, Sisi said in his statement that Egypt needs 200-300 billion dollars to rise, which was no more than deception, selling of illusions and anesthetization of people. Also, the statements of the Egyptian officials about the outcome of the conference’s agreements and understandings came in the same context. Ibrahim Mahlab, the Egyptian Prime Minister at the time, estimated the size of the conventions in the conference at $ 60 billion, represented in an amount of $ 36.2 billion in direct investments, which have already occurred, $ 18.6 billion as funded projects, and $ 5.2 billion in soft loans from international funds and institutions. Added to this, was the commitment of four Arab countries to provide $ 12.5 billion outside the aforementioned numbers, including $ 3.25 billion as bank deposits, and the rest was linked to the existence of real investment. The Egyptian Minister of Investment estimated the EEDC understandings at $ 92 billion, including actual investment agreements of $ 15 billion, installation, operation and funding conventions worth $ 18 billion, as well as agreements for grants and loans of $ 5.2 billion. Thus, the Investment Minister added, in his statement, the grants to the loans, despite the fact that it is the same amount. Also, there was a difference in estimation of the remaining investment agreements; as Mahlab estimated them at $ 54.8 billion, however, the Minister of Investment said they were $ 33 billion. The Minister of Investment also added, in his statement, the new administrative capital project estimated at $ 45 billion, thus raising the value of the investment agreements to $ 78 billion (33+ 45 billion dollars), and then the total agreements and understandings reached up to 175.2 billion dollars (78+5.2+92 billion dollars).
A year has passed and the EEDC has also gone with its massive media whirlwind, and the mobilization of attendees, regardless of being investors or not. People have found nothing but mirage surrounding them from all sides. Moreover, these conflicting numbers went in vain; foreign and even domestic investments have exited from Egypt. Egypt has obtained only $ 6 billion from the Gulf countries as bank deposits with an interest rate. At the same time, these countries have linked any investments in Egypt to the existence of feasibility studies of real investments, which the Egyptian regime could not provide. For example, the Saudi side has rejected, during the Egyptian-Saudi Coordinating Council, a large number of projects submitted by the Egyptian ministries to attract the $ 8 billion that Saudi Arabia had declared it would pump in Egypt in the form of investments. This revealed that the Gulf States have refrained from providing any more cash support to Egypt after they had provided more than $ 40 billion in cash assistance to the coup regime before. However, the Gulf States did not find any significant impact of this support on the reality of the lives of the Egyptians.
Moreover, the World Bank refused, during the economic conference and reiterated this refusal a few days ago, to finance the reclamation of one and a half million acres of land due to the absence of a feasibility study that shows the validity of the lands set for cultivation, and the availability of fresh water. The agreement with the UAE businessman, Mohammed Al-Abbar (chairman of Emaar company) on the new administrative capital project, which was aggressively marketed in the economic conference, has been cancelled. Al-Abbar said at the time that the cost of the first phase of the project was estimated at 45 billion dollars (which is close to the value of Egypt’s external debts). He said then it would depend on funding the project through the capital of the company, “Capital City Partners”, which was founded one week before the conference with Alabbar, himself as its Co-Founder, with a capital of $ 2 billion, Also, Al-Abbar said he would depend on the real estate cash flows, bank loans, funding to be introduced by investors from the Gulf as well as other Arab states. However, this talk had been forgotten and went in vain.
The policy of the misleading media and shameless begging which was one of the EEDC features did not work and the outcome of the conference came to reflect the systematic lying and false glittering promises. The citizen has not found anything except for mirage and deception. The legislation that preceded the conference further entrenched corruption and sale of Egypt, on the pretext of stimulating investment, leaving only debts without assets to the future generations. These procedures included:
• Allowing the government to carry out transactions with direct attribution, without tenders.
• Prohibition of filing appeals to courts or prosecution by a third party concerning the contracts of the government with any party.
• Rejection of a proposal to provide the Investment Authority with detailed maps of all lands.
• Prohibition of bringing the employee to courts for a criminal action or investigating him on intentionally harming public money except at the request of the Prime Minister or his authorized representative.
• Reduction of sales taxes on machinery and equipment and returning them to investors with the introduction of the first tax return.
• Giving non-Egyptians the right to possess land and real estate, even for free, regardless of their nationality.
• Allowing the investor to enter and exit without restrictions.
• Cancellation of the criminal accountability for investors and their followers.
• Allowing the use of foreign labor without specifying the maximum proportion of this employment and transference of all their income abroad.
• Giving the Cabinet authority to grant advantages to intensive-labor companies, including:
a) access to energy at lower prices
b) payment of part of the workers’ training costs by the State.
c) payment of the worker’s and the employer’s share of insurance by the State for a specified period.
Indeed, the EEDC was the entry point for the application of the instructions of the International Monetary Fund by the Egyptian government, through:
a) devaluation of the Egyptian pound against the foreign currency.
b) cutting of subsidies.
c) reduction of the government investments.
People, now, see these measures on the ground and feel their consequences of price rises, shortness of living needs and the increasing poverty, which is pervading Egypt.
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