Faced with a crisis, Egypt’s leader tries a new approach: talking to opponents

Faced with a disastrous economic crisis, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi recently decided it was time to hold talks with what was left of the Egyptian political opposition, to bring them to the table after nearly a decade of oppression , prison and exile.

But for an authoritarian leader like Mr el-Sisi, reconciliation only goes so far.

No sooner had national dialogue begun than the government began to curtail talks, an indication that, after years of political repression and military domination of the economy, the autocratic leaders remain reluctant to turn the page – even if they like their people Western lenders and Gulf allies think otherwise.

Islamists were excluded from the dialogue and much of the secular liberal opposition was not invited. Crucial topics, including anything related to the ill-defined issue of national security, were off limits. And the day after talks began last month, Egypt woke up to news that security agents had arrested a dozen relatives and supporters of the only person to date to announce that he would challenge Mr el-Sisi in the next presidential election. .

Mr el-Sisi has spoken of charting a new political and economic course for Egypt amid rising inflation ‌and a currency that has lost half its value over the past year, pushing the middle class towards poverty . ‌Yet the economic overhaul promised by the government adds up to talk and do little.

“The reality is that the Egyptians are very concerned at the moment and wondering what Egypt’s policy is, where it is going,” Amr Moussa, a former foreign minister, said in unusually sharp public comments last month.

Economists and analysts had long warned that Egypt’s sluggish, state-dominated economy, coupled with Mr. el-Sisi on arms and a construction boom that squeezed short-term growth but produced a staggering debt load was unsound.

Those weaknesses became all too apparent after Russia invaded Ukraine last year, when the price of crucial wheat and fuel imports soared, Russian and Ukrainian tourist revenues dried up and foreign investors pulled dollars out of Egypt.

Despite official attempts to portray the crisis as the inevitable consequences of war, the discontent is audible – loud, by the standards of a country where public criticism of the authorities can mean arrest.

The talks with the opposition are a sign that El-Sisi is feeling the pressure, analysts said. Another came when an MP said last week that presidential elections, expected next year, would be brought forward to the end of this year.

Analysts and diplomats viewed the new schedule as suggesting that the ruling establishment fears Mr el-Sisi’s popularity would fall even further before a vote.

While there is little hope for truly free and fair elections, Mr. el-Sisi and the military security apparatus he represents are keeping up appearances. A high turnout, analysts and diplomats say, would encourage the president to enlist popular support before implementing painful economic reforms.

The stakes couldn’t be much higher for Egypt to recover itself.

Egypt, the most populous country in the Arab world and a longtime strategic ally of the United States, has endured periods of instability in the 12 years since the 2011 Arab Spring uprising, when a short and tumultuous experiment with democracy ended in the military takeover that Mr. el-Sisi in power.

Now more widespread poverty and suffering for many of the country’s 105 million people is all but guaranteed, analysts say. An economic collapse threatens to fuel unrest that could spread to other parts of the Middle East and trigger an exodus of migrants to Europe.

Within months, the country could be forced to choose between paying its debts or feeding the many poor Egyptians who depend on government-subsidized bread.

Perhaps in an attempt to assuage mounting public anger, analysts and diplomats say, the president has also released at least 1,000 political prisoners over the past year.

At the same time, however, there are far more arrests of political activists, investigators, opposition figures and even football fans than those releases. And few expect that the so-called national dialogue will lead to much more than a pile of paper and some photo opportunities.

Diaa Rashwan, the government-appointed coordinator of the dialogue, said at a press conference last month that Egyptians should distinguish between “isolated” arrests and “broader phenomena”, including the openness that the dialogue represents. He claimed that the president could not interfere in the legal proceedings.

The Civil Democratic Movement, a coalition of opposition parties, reluctantly agreed to participate in the talks, believing there was no other way to be heard, even after some of its members were arrested in the run-up, Khaled Dawoud said . member of the coalition.

“Can you imagine how terrifying it must be to work in these conditions?” he said. “If you start the national dialogue and the first step you take is to eliminate a potential candidate and arrest his family and supporters, that is a very bad sign for the presidential election.”

During the last presidential election in 2018, all serious challengers to Mr el-Sisi were jailed on election day.

This time, Ahmed el-Tantawy, his only declared challenger, has already had more than 20 supporters and relatives arrested.

“Political reforms need no dialogue,” said Mr. el-Tantawy. “It takes political will.”

“The average citizen can see that this state has failed to deliver on its promises over the past nine years in the day-to-day economics and in their lack of freedoms,” he added.

When Mr. el-Sisi came to power, he promised stability and prosperity after the turmoil of the 2011 revolution. Many hailed him as a savior.

And Egypt’s strategic importance, in the region and beyond, has long allowed the president to evade a reckoning for the country’s lost spending, sluggish economy and political repression.

While some members of Congress have denounced Egypt’s human rights record, the United States and Europe continue to see the government as a valuable security partner and a vital lynchpin of regional stability. Wealthy Gulf monarchies and Western-backed international lenders have repeatedly come to Egypt’s aid and bolstered its autocratic leadership.

Those lenders are now demanding profound changes, including loosening the military’s stranglehold on many industries and allowing the currency to be traded at its true value rather than artificially bolstering it.

Egypt agreed to a number of such terms last year in exchange for a $3 billion bailout package from the International Monetary Fund.

Still, the results were minimal, hurting national credit and delaying a second installment of the IMF loan originally scheduled for March.

On June 30, about $2 billion would come in through the sale of state assets to Egypt’s resource-rich Gulf neighbors, which have become much less willing to support Mr. el-Sisi, except for profit. But analysts say the country’s military leadership has pushed privatization slowly out of a desire to maintain control and the profits that come with it. The sales and the dollars have not materialized.

The near paralysis has raised the question of how much more the Gulf and the West could pay to stabilize Egypt if it doesn’t bail itself out.

Meanwhile, Egyptians are getting poorer.

The government is lifting fuel and food subsidies that make the lives of millions barely livable, and new spending on social services has failed to keep up with inflation. Poor and middle-class citizens can no longer afford some basic groceries. Elite Cairenes see their savings disappear and their businesses falter.

Alaa, a civil engineer in Sharqiya, northeast of Cairo, said he once supported Mr el-Sisi because his construction company benefited from presidential mega-projects, such as a lavish new capital. Now both Egypt and its company are drowning in debt.

If Alaa doesn’t dodge calls from collection agencies, he said, he’s saving up to get on a boat to Europe illegally.

“Let’s say there’s only a 90 percent chance I’ll make it,” said Alaa, 36, who asked to be identified by his first name only because of the risks of criticizing the president. “That’s still 90 percent more chance of a life than if I stayed in this country.”