This November, a number of Helwan University employees and faculty members were surprised to find leaflets scattered inside the university’s buildings during working hours, accusing the university president, Dr El-Sayed Kandil, and its secretary-general, Major General Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa, of involvement in what the leaflets described as “suspicious deals”, corrupt practices and the abuse of staff through arbitrary contracts and disciplinary and transfer decisions. The leaflets considered that the university’s contract with Major General Abu Shoqa and the pay he receives come at the expense of the workers’ rights, and they also denounced the arbitrary penalties and the new contracts for temporary employees.

These leaflets quickly became the focus of discussion in the corridors of the campus, after the accusations against the university administration had circulated only in whispers among employees and faculty members. They included a statement and an urgent appeal addressed to all officials, signed by a number of people who identified themselves as “the oppressed workers of Helwan University”, in protest at what they considered “a haemorrhage of public money and a haemorrhage of workers”, whether permanent or on contracts.

The statement accused the university’s secretary-general, Major General Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa, of seizing the university’s money without right, explaining that he receives a monthly salary of EGP 50,000, paid in full without being subject to tax, which effectively makes it equivalent to about EGP 75,000, exceeding the maximum wage approved by the Cabinet in 2014. The statement also pointed to the payment to him of the expatriate students bonus even though he is not entitled to it, stating that its value exceeded one million pounds and reached about one million two hundred thousand pounds.

The statement, a copy of which Zawia3 obtained, said that the university’s secretary-general exploits the university’s buffets and runs them for his own account in cooperation with the university president, through university employees, instead of putting these buffets up for lawful public auctions. The statement accused the two of exploiting the buffets and cafeterias spread across the campus, as well as those attached to the performance halls and the guest house, in ways that are illegal and not subject to oversight by the Central Auditing Organisation or the Ministry of Finance.

The statement claimed that Helwan University’s advertisement for the post of university secretary-general was nothing but a legal cover to enable Major General Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa to hold the post permanently, in agreement with the leadership committee which, according to the statement, had been carefully formed by the university president, Dr El-Sayed Kandil, to guarantee his selection. The statement explained that none of the conditions stipulated in the Law on the Organisation of Universities or the Civil Service Law apply to him, foremost among them the requirement of at least ten years’ experience in university and administrative affairs.

The statement added that Major General Abu Shoqa, who holds a civilian post in which the use of military titles is prohibited by law, was delegated to the post by Decision No. 172, issued on 24 May 2023, which provided for Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Mohamed Abu Shoqa, an undersecretary at the Administrative Control Authority, to perform the duties of university secretary-general for a year from 1 June 2024, even though he has no previous experience in university affairs. The statement considered this contract void and unlawful, noting that the university president, Dr El-Sayed Kandil, issued Decision No. 1888 on 29 May 2025, which renewed Abu Shoqa’s secondment and kept him on as acting secretary-general of the university for a second month from 1 July 2025.

On 27 July, Helwan University announced, through Advertisement No. (2) of 2025, that it needed to fill two leadership posts: university secretary-general at the Excellent level, and Director General of the General Department of Legal Affairs Departments at the Director General job level, on the basis of the provisions of Civil Service Law No. 81 of 2016 and its executive regulations issued by Prime Ministerial Decree No. 1216 of 2017, as well as Law No. 47 of 1973 regulating the work of legal affairs departments.

The advertisement stressed that appointment to these posts is conditional on meeting all the requirements for holding them, and that no decision would be issued by the authority competent to appoint until the prescribed training programme had been successfully completed. The advertisement also stipulated that applications be submitted in person, addressed to Prof. Dr El-Sayed Kandil, the university president, on the form prepared for that purpose, to the Permanent Committee for the Selection of Leaders at the main administration headquarters on the fourth floor, within a maximum of one month from the date the advertisement was published.

After that, the Administrative Control Authority sent an official letter, signed by Ahmed Mohamed Nour El-Din, Undersecretary of the Administrative Control Authority, to the president of Helwan University, Prof. Dr El-Sayed Kandil, regarding the nomination of one of its undersecretaries for the post of university secretary-general. The letter, dated 12 May 2024, stated that the authority nominates Mr Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Mohamed Abu Shoqa for secondment from the Administrative Control Authority to take on the duties of university secretary-general for a year from 1 June 2024.

On 23 May 2024, the president of Helwan University issued Decision No. 1704, under which he assigned Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Mohamed Abu Shoqa, a member of the Administrative Control Authority, to perform the duties of university secretary-general for a year from 1 June 2024. The decision included the Administrative Control Authority’s approval of the secondment of Abu Shoqa, of the authority’s senior grade, to take on the duties of his post, with a monthly salary of EGP 50,000 approved, in addition to the bonuses and allowances prescribed for the university’s administrative leaders.

On 29 May 2025, the president of Helwan University issued Decision No. 1888, which provided for the renewal of Mr Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa’s secondment for one month from 1 June 2025, on the basis that he would be assigned to perform the duties of university secretary-general on a contractual basis from 1 July 2025, after the matter was put to the University Council.

The leaflets thrown to the employees claimed that the university president had illegally delegated to the secretary-general, the major general, the management of every matter, large and small, inside the university, out of fear of him, to evade responsibility or to devote himself to running his private company; and that although the illegal delegation of Mohamed Abu Shoqa, who was contracted under a contract that violates the law, No. 1888 dated 29 May 2025, had ended, the contract was not renewed after its expiry. It added that he nevertheless abuses staff by imposing arbitrary penalties and deductions and issues orders arbitrarily transferring them from their workplaces, citing Executive Order No. 77, issued on 19 August 2025, and Executive Order No. 78 of 20 August 2025, which it described as a massacre in which competent and experienced staff were transferred from their posts.

Criticism of the university secretary-general’s powers

For its part, an academic source at Helwan University, who refused to be named, reveals that a state of fury has spread among the university’s employees and professors, who have seen documents proving that Major General Mohamed Abu Shoqa, the university’s secretary-general, received huge sums as bonuses, exceeding the maximum wage permitted by law. The source confirms to Zawia3 that one of the expatriate students bonuses the secretary-general received reached EGP 200,000, while his salary is 50,000, besides other bonuses he received worth 170,000 and 180,000, bringing the total to more than one million eight hundred thousand pounds in less than twelve months.

The source explains that Major General Abu Shoqra was brought in as a national expert, and that he may not hold the post of secretary-general permanently, according to the Cabinet’s reply to an inquiry from the Minister of Higher Education about approving the appointment of Mr Mohamed Abdel Hafeez as secretary-general of the university. The Cabinet’s reply at the time was to limit his engagement to that of a national expert only, meaning that he may not hold the post of university secretary-general. The source points out that, although this decision was issued in the fourth month, he is still acting secretary-general of the university, but he does not receive his basic salary from Chapter One of the budget so as not to violate the minister’s decision; instead, he receives only bonuses, informally, while his official salary is suspended.

Prime Minister’s Decree No. 63 of 2014 on regulating the maximum income for workers in state bodies, issued on 19 January 2014, stipulates that the net monthly income of any worker in the state’s administrative apparatus, local administration units, public authorities or their affiliated companies, or of anyone paid from their funds, may not exceed thirty-five times the minimum wage, and may not exceed forty-two thousand pounds a month. This cap applies to all workers, whether permanent, temporary, advisers or national experts, regardless of the source of their income, whether from their original employer or from other bodies. The decree covers all forms of wages, bonuses, incentives, allowances and fees for attending committees and boards of directors, and the only exceptions are sums paid in return for actual expenses, such as the travel allowance or transport or accommodation expenses, when they are paid in accordance with the applicable rules.

The monthly maximum is calculated on the basis of the average of what the worker receives during the year divided by twelve months, and any amount exceeding the set limit is to be transferred to the public treasury, with the accounting carried out at the end of December each year. Article Two of the law exempted from this maximum those working in diplomatic, consular and commercial representation bodies and others who represent the state abroad, and also exempted bodies of a special nature to be designated by a Prime Ministerial decree. It obliged government bodies, authorities and state-affiliated companies that pay sums to workers to notify the worker’s employer, within thirty days of the date of payment, of all the sums he receives, and required auditors at the Ministry of Finance and the Central Auditing Organisation to verify that the notification has been made, holding the competent employee disciplinarily responsible in the event of a violation.

The academic source explains that some workers and employees threw leaflets to their colleagues inside the university exposing the documents that incriminate the university’s secretary-general, and that Abu Shoqa questioned the workers to find out how these leaflets had got there, according to the source. The source claims that the secretary-general runs the university’s (buffets) located in the administrative buildings for his personal account, whereas tenders should have been put out for suppliers to compete for, and also accuses him of employing workers in them for EGP 1,000 or EGP 1,500 a month, regardless of whether this affects their main work as cleaners, adding: “These canteens operate by direct order, and no one knows where their revenues go,” in the source’s words.

The source believes that the powers of the university’s secretary-general have exceeded the authority of the university president himself, in a way that arouses suspicion, to the point of cancelling decisions taken by the university president himself, such as decisions to transfer some employees, and that any matter referred to the university president is marked “To be referred to the university secretary-general, Mohamed Abu Shoqa”, even in academic matters that are none of the secretary-general’s business.

Zawia3 has seen a copy of Executive Order No. 78, issued by the secretary-general of Helwan University on 20 August 2025, issuing Decision No. 1773 of 1 June 2024 delegating to the secretary-general some of the powers of the President of the University.

Although the delegation issued on 1 June 2024 was supposed to last for a year and then end on 30 June 2025, the executive order was dated 20 August 2025, that is, two months after the delegation had ended. According to our sources, the executive order is void because it was issued on the basis of an old delegation from the university president to the university secretary-general, which was not renewed and had expired before the decision was issued.

The Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Dr Mohamed Ayman Ashour, had sent an official letter to Prof. Dr El-Sayed Kandil, president of Helwan University, dated 22 September 2025, in which he referred to the letter issued by the university on 3 February 2025 regarding the contract with Mr Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa to perform the duties of university secretary-general for one year from 1 February 2025.

In his letter, which Zawia3 has seen, the minister explained that the ministry had received a letter from the Cabinet Presidency (Head of the Cabinet’s Advisory Board) on the same subject, indicating that the matter had been put to the Prime Minister, who directed approval of contracting the person in question to work as a national expert at Helwan University, and not as secretary-general of the university. The letter concluded with a request from the Minister of Higher Education to the university president to review what had been received from the Cabinet Presidency and to take whatever action he deems appropriate in this regard.

An image of the letter from the Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Dr Mohamed Ayman Ashour, to Prof. Dr El-Sayed Kandil, president of Helwan University, regarding the contract with Mr Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa

According to Helwan University President’s Decision No. 1704, issued on 23 May 2024, the monthly salary of the university’s secretary-general, Mohamed Abu Shoqa, is EGP 50,000, excluding the bonuses and allowances prescribed for the university’s administrative leaders, and official statements of payment movements and financial transactions in the name of Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Mohamed Abu Shoqa, secretary-general of Helwan University, a copy of which Zawia3 obtained, show that he received huge total sums over a period of less than a year, including regular monthly payments and exceptional bonuses. The documented data showed that the total of the sums transferred to Abu Shoqa amounted to EGP 915,505.65 (nine hundred and fifteen thousand, five hundred and five pounds and 65 piastres) between July 2024 and April 2025.

The statements also recorded semi-regular payments ranging between EGP 10,000 and 11,000 (such as EGP 10,782.40, EGP 10,766.96 and EGP 10,688.00), in addition to dozens of smaller payments, between hundreds of pounds and a few thousand, such as EGP 1,786.75, EGP 8,935.80 and EGP 372.75, which may indicate allowances or bonuses for specific tasks.

These statements raise questions about why the secretary-general of Helwan University received these sums, on top of his monthly salary, set at EGP 50,000, especially the payment of nearly EGP 177,000, which calls for scrutiny of the bonus and incentive regulations applied to officials of public universities.

The crisis of temporary workers at Helwan University

The leaflets incident and the accusations of financial corruption that employees at Helwan University are levelling at its secretary-general come a few months after more than 280 temporary employees at the university were subjected to a systematic legal and administrative violation, in the form of new contracts that strip them of the status of public employee and threaten them with dismissal without protection or rights, despite their legal entitlement to permanent appointment under laws and regulations in force.

Zawia3 had published, last June, a copy of the new contract that the university administration is asking workers to sign, which stipulates that the first party, Helwan University, represented by its president or his legal deputy, concludes an agreement with the second party, the employee, to perform job duties, and that both parties acknowledge their consent to this contract. Under the second clause, the second party undertakes to carry out all the work assigned to him by the first party, in line with the nature of the work, and to submit periodic progress reports. The third clause sets the term of the contract, stressing that it is not renewed automatically but requires the explicit approval of the first party.

The fourth clause stipulates that the worker receives an “all-inclusive contractual remuneration” covering all entitlements, and that this amount is subject to the taxes provided for in Egyptian law. The fifth clause obliges the second party to perform the work accurately and honestly and to devote working hours to completing tasks, prohibits accepting any gifts or commissions, and holds him responsible for any errors in execution. The sixth clause of the new contract stipulates that the second party has no right to demand permanent appointment on the basis of this contract, except within the limits of the regulations and laws issued by the Central Agency for Organisation and Administration and the Ministry of Finance. It also obliges the worker not to violate any of the legal provisions, regulations or internal rules in force within the administrative unit.

The seventh clause sets out the disciplinary penalties if the worker violates the requirements of his job duties or appears in a manner that undermines the dignity of the post, including: a warning; a deduction from the all-inclusive remuneration for a period not exceeding ten days at a time or thirty days a year; and a 15-day deduction with a warning of termination of the contract; and the matter may go as far as final termination of the contract.

The eighth clause sets out the cases in which the contract may be terminated, including: the employee’s request to terminate the contract with the approval of the competent body; absence from work for five consecutive days or ten non-consecutive days without an acceptable excuse; committing a violation that affects the dignity of the public post; or the purpose of continuing the contract having ended. In these cases, the body notifies the employee of the decision to terminate the contract at least a month in advance. It also stipulates that termination of the contract does not exempt the second party from any disciplinary or legal liability.

Article 73 of Civil Service Law No. 81 of 2016 provides for the appointment of temporary and contract workers who were contracted before 30 June 2016 to the lowest grades under the fixed-wages item, after at least three years have passed since their transfer to the (seasonal workers’ wages) item in Chapter One (Wages), provided that they meet the conditions for holding these posts.

A document issued by the Department of University Council Secretariat Affairs at Helwan University last July, a copy of which Zawia3 obtained, includes a presentation of the University Council’s decision at its session No. (569), held on 28 June 2025, concerning the ratification of the minutes of the session held on 17 June 2025 and the approval of the financial and administrative decisions they contained, with a number of specific amendments.

The amendments dealt with item No. (23), concerning the memorandum of the major general acting as university secretary-general on considering approval of the following: renewing the contracts of those who had previously signed contracts, from 1 July 2025, numbering 55 employment contracts and 63 service contracts, provided that the contracts are signed by Prof. Dr the University President as the first party, or by whomever he authorises to sign; notifying the faculties, departments, centres and units of the names of those whose contracts have been renewed so that their names can be activated and added to the fingerprint system from 1 July 2025; and informing the University Council of the amendments to the schedule of financial entitlements for the all-inclusive remuneration category of temporary contracts, after their approval by the House of Representatives and the issuance of the law setting the rate of the periodic bonus for those subject to the Civil Service Law and granting a special bonus to those not subject to it.

The financial amendments were as follows: medical staff (EGP 8,500 instead of EGP 8,900), higher qualification (EGP 6,000 instead of EGP 7,000), above-intermediate and intermediate qualification (EGP 4,500 instead of EGP 6,500), drivers of all qualifications (EGP 4,500 instead of EGP 6,350), auxiliary services, with or without qualifications, (EGP 5,200 instead of EGP 6,200).

The document indicates that these values do not include other allowances paid by the departments, faculties and main offices according to the nature of the work, such as the effort allowance, the footwear allowance and others, in accordance with previous approvals. The paragraph on the rate of annual increase was also amended to read: the annual increase approved by the Ministry of Finance and prescribed for their appointed peers.

On 30 June, 63 temporary employees at Helwan University filed a report documenting the situation at Helwan police station (No. 5067 Administrative), after one of their colleagues, named Hamed Ahmed, suffered a nervous shock that left him unconscious and was taken to hospital as a result, upon discovering that he had been deceived by the university administration, which had pushed him to sign a new employment contract under which he would become a day labourer without job rights, instead of a university employee working under a temporary contract that is renewed automatically.

Following that, the Department of University Council Secretariat Affairs at Helwan University issued a decision on 10 July 2025 that the job or financial position of any of the contracted employees who had not yet signed the new contracts approved by the council should not be harmed, stressing that their salaries and financial entitlements would continue to be paid regularly until the signing procedures were completed. The decision was signed by both the department director, Mohamed Mahmoud El-Desouky, and the university’s secretary-general, Major General Mohamed Abdel Hafeez Abu Shoqa.

 

Despite the decision, Ahmed Hussein (a pseudonym), one of the temporary employees at Helwan University, affirms to Zawia3 that the university administration is still pressuring workers to sign contracts that violate the law, pointing to an earlier Cabinet decision stipulating that no new contracts be drawn up after the issuance of the Civil Service Law.

He says: “We submitted complaints to the Cabinet about the pressure exerted on us to sign contracts that violate the law, and we have an earlier Cabinet decision stipulating that no new contracts be drawn up after the issuance of the Civil Service Law. Despite this, the university’s secretary-general is still, to this day, telling ordinary workers that they have lost the case and urging them to sign the contracts, even though the University Council met and issued a decision stipulating that the financial and administrative rights of the contracted employees must not be infringed. Indeed, the employees who did not sign the contracts stayed in their posts and are receiving their salaries as usual, but he is still fighting to impose his view until the last moment.”

The employee explains that the temporary employees have exhausted the legal avenues and that they intend to follow up on the reasoning of the ruling in order to prepare an appeal backed by documents, adding: “We had threatened to bring our families and stage a sit-in in front of the university gate, but a representative of the Public Prosecutor’s office, who attended the University Council meeting, intervened and obliged them to include the phrase ‘no infringement of the rights of contracted employees’.”

In March, MP Samira El-Gazzar, a member of the House of Representatives for the Egyptian Social Democratic Party, submitted a briefing request addressed to both the Prime Minister, Eng. Mostafa Madbouly, and the Minister of Labour, Mohamed Gebran, regarding the crisis of the temporary workers at Helwan University, who were surprised by the termination of their contracts after 13 years of work without legal justification, and by being forced to sign new contracts containing unfair clauses that squander their job and financial rights.

It is worth noting that the Cabinet recently approved two draft Prime Ministerial decrees amending certain provisions of the Law on the Organisation of Universities issued by Law No. 49 of 1972, the first of which stipulates that the phrase “Capital University” replaces the phrase “Helwan University” wherever it appears in the Law on the Organisation of Universities issued by Law No. 49 of 1972 or in any other law.

In conclusion, it can be said that the leaflets scattered over the heads of the workers inside Helwan University were nothing but a muffled cry of protest that came out into the open, revealing an environment in which the principle of transparency is absent, the voice of the employee recedes before the influence of senior positions, and suspicions of financial corruption intersect with administrative abuses. While ordinary employees are held to account through arbitrary disciplinary and transfer decisions, senior officials remain beyond accountability,

which calls for the oversight bodies and the Ministry of Higher Education to intervene and conduct a serious and public investigation into the suspicions of administrative and financial corruption that threaten the standing of educational institutions and the trust of those who work in them.

The official statements also shed light on an obscure side of the administrative system inside public universities: at a time when higher education institutions suffer from budget deficits and delays in paying staff entitlements, these data reveal recurring financial flows to a single official approaching one million pounds in less than a year, which opens the door wide to legitimate questions about the mechanisms of oversight and accountability in the management of public money.

Zawia3 affirms that the Helwan University administration’s right of reply is fully guaranteed.

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