{"id":17732,"date":"2025-01-03T18:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-01-03T16:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/?p=17732"},"modified":"2026-10-24T15:08:28","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T13:08:28","slug":"mubarak-era-business-figures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/mubarak-era-business-figures\/","title":{"rendered":"Madbouly and Mubarak-Era Businessmen: A Fresh Start or the Same Economic Order?"},"content":{"rendered":"

After more than 13 years of absence from the political scene, Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly met a group of businessmen who had played prominent roles during the era of former President Hosni Mubarak. The meeting comes in the context of the government’s efforts to bolster the faltering economy and attract investment, amid an escalating economic crisis that is casting its shadow over various sectors.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although the Mubarak era ended with the January 2011 revolution, whose causes were attributed to political and economic mismanagement, this meeting raised many questions about its significance at this particular time. Does it reflect an attempt to draw on past expertise, or a step towards reintegrating the men of the old regime into the economic arena?<\/span><\/p>\n

The meeting, held on 25 December, followed the government’s weekly meeting and was devoted to reviewing the challenges facing the private sector. During it, “Madbouly” listened to the businessmen’s views on possible measures to stimulate economic growth in the coming year. Meanwhile, some interpreted the return of the spotlight to “Mubarak’s businessmen” as the government’s attempt to search the expertise of the past to confront the crises that have been accumulating for more than a decade and that peaked in recent years.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The meeting held by Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly was attended by a number of prominent businessmen who had been pillars of the economic system during the era of former President Hosni Mubarak, which sparked wide controversy over the dimensions of this meeting and its political and economic implications.<\/span><\/p>\n

The meeting included Ahmed Ezz, a former leading figure in the dissolved National Democratic Party, who was considered one of the most influential figures in shaping economic policy during the Mubarak era. Also present was Hassan Heikal, son of the journalist and writer Mohamed Hassanein Heikal, who stood trial for eight years on charges of stock market manipulation alongside Alaa and Gamal Mubarak before being acquitted in February 2020.<\/span><\/p>\n

Among those present was also Hisham Talaat Moustafa, the well-known businessman and member of the dissolved National Democratic Party, who left prison under a presidential pardon in 2017 after serving six years of a 15-year prison sentence in the case of the murder of the Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim. Also taking part was Yasseen Mansour, who faced a freeze on his assets in 2011 over corruption charges relating to accounts at “Credit Suisse”, before being acquitted in 2012 after a financial settlement amounting to EGP 250 million. Despite this prominent attendance, notable names were absent from the meeting, among them Naguib Sawiris and his brothers.<\/span><\/p>\n

The question is being raised as to whether this meeting is a government step to revive the role of formerly influential businessmen to contribute to rescuing the economy, or whether it reflects a gradual return of faces from the Mubarak regime to the circle of economic decision-making in light of the worsening economic crisis the country faces.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Sugar in Egypt: Scarcity, Rising Prices and Monopoly Despite the Political Leadership’s Attention <\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Administration, Debt and Interest<\/b><\/h1>\n

During the meeting, the businessmen presented a set of proposals to confront the current challenges, among them: strengthening private sector participation in the economy, preparing a new export subsidy rebate programme, reconsidering interest rates, adopting new rules for the return of construction in villages, and bringing new cadres from graduates of foreign universities into the state’s administrative apparatus.<\/span><\/p>\n

Businessman Ahmed Ezz, chairman of Ezz Steel Group, criticised the decline in the growth rate of the construction, building and real estate activities sector in Egypt during the current period, despite it having achieved growth equal to double and more the growth rates achieved in the country’s gross domestic product. He considered that the most important indicator in the construction and building sector is the consumption of steel and cement, pointing out that in 2010 steel consumption in Egypt was 9.9 million tonnes, and in the last three years consumption fell to 6.5, 6.4 and 6.2 million tonnes.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Ezz” explained that 70% of Egypt’s population is currently barred from building. Five thousand villages and 120 districts in the governorates cannot build, whereas in the past the authorities issued 60,000 building permits annually, adding: “This does not mean that we are calling for a return to informal building, but the matter requires new rules, because continuing in the same current direction is causing the construction and building sector to fall severely behind.” <\/span><\/p>\n

He pointed out that the state’s administrative apparatus needs a return of hiring and the opening of the door to appointing young people in the government sector, especially with 40,000 Egyptian students studying at foreign universities, explaining that the number of employees in the state’s administrative apparatus fell from six million employees ten years ago to about 3.5 million employees. Businessman Hassan Heikal, for his part, aimed his criticism during the meeting at the rising levels of domestic and foreign debt and the state’s general budget bearing greater interest, explaining that the domestic public debt on the budget had reached EGP 10 trillion, and that when an interest rate of 30% is added, debt interest becomes EGP 3 trillion, and the Egyptian state has no resources that could convince a financier that there will be balance in the foreseeable future.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Heikal” presented several proposals during the meeting, among them transferring state assets to the Central Bank of Egypt, zeroing out debts in pounds, and establishing a sovereign fund affiliated with the Central Bank comprising the companies, real estate and land of all government and sovereign bodies, adding: “This fund can be used to achieve the goal of budget unity at the level of the state, and to benefit from the returns in financing development projects and the authorities’ plans.” He pointed out that this proposal had previously been implemented in a similar form in Spain, Italy and Greece to rescue them during the debt crisis.<\/span><\/p>\n

As for businessman Hisham Talaat Moustafa, chief executive officer and managing director of “Talaat Moustafa Group Holding”, he criticised the current high levels of interest rates in Egypt, saying: “I do not think that the financing structures of Egyptian companies are able to bear an interest rate of 32% indefinitely.” He pointed out that there is a problem in the banking sector, that current interest rates are in the interest of neither the private sector nor the state budget and must be looked at, and that the annual dollar deficit is the biggest problem facing the Egyptian economy, one that has major repercussions and must be resolved.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Closed Factories in Egypt: Will They Raise the Import Bill and Affect Strategic Goods? <\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The IMF Is the Password<\/b><\/h1>\n

In the view of <\/span>Mohamed Ramadan<\/b>, researcher on economic and social rights at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), the meeting did not offer clear solutions for getting through the economic crisis, and the discussions centred on setting the interest rate and real estate development, which depends primarily on controlling the interest rate to guarantee the sale of property units and avoid stagnation in the real estate market. Consequently, the discussion focused primarily on the businessmen’s personal interests.<\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking to Zawia3, he points to the importance of dealing seriously with what businessman Ahmed Ezz raised regarding the administrative apparatus and its crises, especially since this proposal comes from a representative of the private sector, and to the fact that Egypt suffers from a major crisis in the administrative apparatus, contrary to what the authorities promote about this apparatus being bloated.<\/span><\/p>\n

The researcher in economic rights considers the meeting to be a message directed at the International Monetary Fund, to prove the involvement of the private sector in line with the wishes of the Fund, which directs the state to support the private sector. He stresses that the economic crisis in Egypt will only end with the existence of a political will to resolve it in a radical and genuine way.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the same context, <\/span>Akram Ismail<\/b>, a leading figure in the Bread and Freedom Party (under formation) and the Civil Democratic Movement, believes that the government is using the businessmen’s support as a card before the International Monetary Fund, especially after the businessmen expressed their discontent with the economic policies the government has pursued over the past years, as well as with the extent of the army’s intervention in the economy. “Therefore, this meeting comes as an attempt to satisfy the IMF and investors.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Nevertheless, “Ismail” believes that the position of the IMF and foreign investors does not depend solely on the opinions of Egyptian businessmen, even though their opinions remain important, but there are other factors that influence decisions. <\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking to us, the Bread and Freedom Party leader explains that the conflict between the administration of the El-Sisi regime and businessmen has never stopped, and this has manifested itself in the imposition of taxes on capital and then backing down on them, in the arrest of businessman Salah Diab and then his release, as well as in the withdrawal of land on the North Coast. These practices confirm that there is an ongoing process of mutual pressure between the two sides, and that this meeting constitutes the most prominent of the real negotiations taking place on the ground in Egypt.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He adds that Egypt lacks genuine trade unions that defend the poor and strong leftist parties that express the lower-income classes. For this reason, the country is witnessing a kind of social negotiation between two wings with intertwined interests: the military bureaucratic authority and the businessmen. Hence, these sessions are considered the most important negotiations taking place between the wings of the social order, in the absence of civil organisations and unions, which leads to ordinary citizens being marginalised from these negotiations.<\/span><\/p>\n

From a political standpoint, Ismail believes that there is a stifling economic crisis, and that the state needs money from abroad that has not yet arrived, while it is subject to pressure from the International Monetary Fund because of the army’s involvement in the economy, which makes it try to find a way out of this predicament.<\/span><\/p>\n

Earlier, the International Monetary Fund <\/span>announced<\/span><\/a> that it had reached a staff-level agreement with Egypt on the fourth review of the Extended Fund Facility programme, which will enable Egypt to obtain about USD 1.2 billion, but the transfer of the amount will be subject to the approval of the Fund’s Executive Board.<\/span><\/p>\n

Egypt completed the first review with the Fund and obtained a tranche worth USD 347 million, then followed it with the second and third tranches worth USD 820 million each, bringing the total Egypt had obtained by the end of the third review to USD 1.98 billion.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Workers.. Fuel for Businessmen’s Profits: The State Watches! <\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

An Attempt to Solve the Crisis or to Beautify It?<\/b><\/h1>\n

Economic researcher <\/span>Zohdy El-Shamy<\/b>, deputy head of the Socialist Popular Alliance Party, believes that this meeting has political implications that reflect the policies of the current regime. After 14 years have passed, and with every crisis, the regime goes back to searching either for the men of the former Mubarak regime, because they are part of the power structure, or summons some faces from the International Monetary Fund, which is talked about from time to time; but the truth is that this authority is not serious about searching for radical solutions to get out of the crisis it caused.<\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking to Zawia3, he adds that the International Monetary Fund wants the status quo to continue without reaching real solutions to the economic crisis that has been worsening for three years and that erupted with the flight of hot money from Egypt in 2022. This event exposed the real Egyptian economic situation and pushed the authorities to resort to the National Dialogue to manipulate and escape confronting the real crisis without acknowledging it or searching for credible solutions.<\/span><\/p>\n

The economic researcher stresses that the attempt to return to Mubarak’s men or to turn to the IMF again is nothing but a continuation of the same approach of manipulation. These people, in reference to Mubarak’s businessmen, will not be able to offer real solutions to the crisis, especially since some of the problems have their roots in the Mubarak era, such as privatisation, inflation, the manipulation of state figures and the public debt. He added that Mubarak’s finance minister, Youssef Boutros Ghali, had written off EGP 200 billion of the public debt after seizing the social insurance funds and merging the pension funds, which led to false promotion of a decline in the public debt to cover up its real crisis.<\/span><\/p>\n

The deputy head of the Socialist Popular Alliance Party insists that any economic reform must be linked to genuine political reform. Positive results cannot be achieved without a comprehensive reform of the system by which the country is run and radical political changes.<\/span><\/p>\n

For her part, <\/span>Mona Ezzat<\/b>, researcher on economic and social rights, believes that dialogue sessions may be useful in principle, as they provide an opportunity for direct communication between the government and the private sector. These meetings are considered part of the National Dialogue that politicians and some opposition figures supported. But in the end, these sessions lose their seriousness and effectiveness because the state does not take real and clear steps to implement the recommendations, adopt the opinions presented and come out with a clear report on the extent of its engagement with the proposals.<\/span><\/p>\n

Speaking to us, she explains that the loss of seriousness in such meetings leads to a decline in enthusiasm and interest in them, which reflects negatively on citizens who had been following these sessions and pinning hopes on them. Therefore, we are waiting for what the authorities will present in the way of a report on the results of the discussions with the businessmen, or whether the fate of these meetings will be like the sessions of the National Dialogue, pointing out that the authorities need to bring consistency between the policies they announce and what they implement on the ground. “Meaning that the authorities talk about the need to expand the role of the private sector, which in turn needs a clear economic policy and incentive measures, provided that these measures do not come at the expense of the rights of male and female workers in factories and companies. The basic goal of involving the private sector must be to provide decent job opportunities with fair wages, contracts and social insurance, to improve citizens’ conditions and strengthen development indicators. But there is a slowdown in implementing this goal, which increases poverty and unemployment rates and weakens people’s confidence in these meetings and discussions, including the private sector itself.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Mona stresses that in this way the state is weakening all the mechanisms of dialogue and the opportunities that could contribute to setting productive economic policies that help improve development indicators.<\/span><\/p>\n

The value of the local currency<\/a> fell again against the dollar, with the dollar exceeding EGP 51, after the Central Bank’s decision last March to float the exchange rate again, for the sixth time since 2016, as part of implementing the International Monetary Fund’s conditions for granting Egypt a loan worth USD 8 billion, which included, alongside floating the exchange rate, selling assets owned by the state and the army and empowering the private sector.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Recommended reading: <\/b>Selling Egyptian Assets: Between the Dollar Crisis and the Profits of the Abu Dhabi Fund <\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nothing New<\/b><\/h1>\n

The appearance of those known as Mubarak’s men during their meeting with the head of government stirred controversy in political circles, which considered this meeting the first of its kind since the fall of Mubarak and his ruling empire. But Zawia3 monitored their moves over the previous years aimed at rescuing the Egyptian state from economic stumbles, through a number of dollar deals that ended with businessmen buying some assets.<\/span><\/p>\n

In December 2023, Egypt’s Talaat Moustafa Group, through its subsidiary, the Arab Company for Hotel and Tourism Investments (Icon), acquired<\/a> a stake of up to 51% in seven hotels owned by the Egyptian government, worth USD 800 million. In February of last year, 2024, Icon signed the final acquisition contract for the 51% majority stake, with full management rights, in Legacy Hotels and Tourism Projects Company through a capital increase.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The seven hotels are the Sofitel Old Cataract Aswan, which dates back to 1899, the M\u00f6venpick Resort Aswan, the Sofitel Winter Palace Luxor, which was built in 1886, the Steigenberger Tahrir, the Steigenberger Cecil Alexandria, the Marriott Mena House in Cairo and the Marriott Omar Khayyam in Cairo. The sale of the hotels owned by the Egyptian government came as part of the offerings programme on which Egypt is counting to generate cash liquidity in foreign currency.<\/span><\/p>\n

During last year, businessman Ahmed Ezz <\/span>bought<\/span><\/a> the Egyptian government’s stake in Ezz Dekheila Steel and delisted it from the Egyptian Exchange, as the company’s general assembly approved the purchase of the shares of government bodies, amounting to about 32.9%, at a value of up to EGP 8 billion, owned by several bodies, most prominently: (the National Investment Bank, the National Bank of Egypt, Banque Misr, the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation and Misr Insurance), in addition to other government bodies.<\/span><\/p>\n

It was attended by all the government shareholders, with approval by up to 97% of the company’s total shareholders, in addition to approval also of financing the purchase deal through the dollar loan that Ezz Dekheila announced it had obtained from Emirates NBD. This came after the board of directors of “Ezz Dekheila Steel” approved the voluntary delisting of the shares of “Al Ezz Dekheila Steel Company \u2013 Alexandria” from the Exchange, with the purchase of the shares of those harmed by the voluntary delisting at a price of EGP 1,250 per share, and the government bodies sold their stake in the company through this process for a value of up to USD 241 million. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span>Elhamy El-Merghany<\/b>, economic researcher and analyst, believes that Egypt has for decades been ruled by a class alliance of state capitalism, real estate capitalism, importers and agents of foreign companies, “So when the prime minister holds a meeting with businessmen, this is natural, but we have not seen him or anyone else meet representatives of farmers or workers or pensioners, or even doctors, engineers and teachers, because the aim of the meeting is to achieve more consensus between the poles of the ruling class alliance and to make policies that serve more of its economic hegemony and their monopolies that magnify their profits.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“El-Merghany” sheds light on Hisham Talaat Moustafa, who spoke as an example at the meeting about the impact of inflation and the exchange rate on their activity and profits, as a model of businessmen on the one hand, and of the real estate sector closest to leading the class alliance with state capitalism on the other, in addition to his group’s well-known partnership with state capitalism. <\/span><\/p>\n

He points out that this partnership granted the group the land of Al-Rehab City and Madinaty at low prices, then its companies in the New Administrative Capital, New Alamein and Ras El-Hekma, which achieved fantastic profits for the group, as “Talaat Moustafa Group Holding, the largest real estate company listed on the Egyptian Exchange, achieved net profits of EGP 2.23 billion in 2022, an annual increase of 25%, supported by sales of residential property units and commercial offices, according to a company statement, particularly in the group’s project in the Administrative Capital, “Celia”, and the performance of the hotel sector. The group’s consolidated revenues increased on an annual basis by 29% to about EGP 19.9 billion in 2022. In addition to the deal to acquire the 7 hotels through its hotel arm “Ico”.<\/span><\/p>\n

Talaat Moustafa Group Holding revealed<\/a> that it had achieved unprecedented sales worth more than half a trillion pounds, ten billion (dollars, up to last 22 December 2024). The company said, in a statement sent to the Egyptian Exchange, the record sales to expansion into new markets, such as the Saudi market and Egypt’s North Coast region. It said that the volume of sales reached an unprecedented level of about 28,000 units during the year, up from about 17,000 units sold in 2023, as the value of sales jumped 3.5 times compared with EGP 143 billion in 2023. The company achieved profits of EGP 9.06 billion during the period from January to the end of September 2024, compared with EGP 2.69 billion in the comparable period of 2023. The company’s real estate revenues during the nine months rose to EGP 16.05 billion, compared with EGP 13.52 billion in the comparable period of the previous year Moustafa Holding\u00bb achieves sales worth half a trillion pounds.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“El-Merghany” believes that these figures reflect the truth of the suffering and losses that Hisham Talaat Moustafa spoke about during his meeting, and what Naguib Sawiris affirmed is 100% correct about these fabulous profits that the real estate sector reaps from the partnership with the authorities, and that bureaucratic state capitalism and its corrupt agencies are what pump billions as profits into the coffers of the real estate sector and other sectors cooperating with state capitalism. Therefore, the problems of the dollar rate and the problems of interest rates may constitute an obstacle for the agricultural and industrial sectors, the medium and small investor and the informal sector. But they pump billions in revenues and profits into the real estate sector, such as the companies of Hisham Talaat Moustafa, the Sawiris family and the Mansour family.<\/span><\/p>\n

He explains that the head of government’s meeting with the businessmen ended as had the meeting with journalists and media figures before it, and the meeting with experts and thinkers, and before them the National Dialogue with all its studies and recommendations. “In the face of this, the government will not stop external and domestic borrowing, will not achieve budget unity, will not withdraw from economic activity and will not examine the reasons for companies fleeing abroad and the reasons for foreign investment shunning Egypt; the plans for privatisation and selling, inflation and the exchange rate continue. Everything said at the meeting is mere talk, because this government listens only to its own voice and its interests, and it implements everything that achieves that. Therefore, things remain as they are.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Cairo is awaiting the meetings of the IMF’s Executive Board to approve the disbursement of the fourth tranche, worth 922.87 million Special Drawing Rights (equivalent to USD 1.2 billion), under the USD 8 billion loan, following the completion of the fourth review of Egypt’s programme during the last week of last December. During the period from April to August 2024, Egypt received the second and third tranches of the IMF loan, each worth USD 820 million. The first tranche, which Egypt obtained at the end of 2022, was worth USD 347 million.<\/span><\/p>\n

Editorial correction: The first version of the report stated that hot money left Egypt in 2021; in fact its exit, estimated at about USD 20 billion, took place in 2022 following the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, according to economic coverage published in June 2022.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 13 years of trials and disappearance, the Egyptian government opens its old ledgers and summons Mubarak’s men again, while domestic debt reaches EGP 10 trillion and construction rates fall to 60% of what they were in 2010<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11520,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[412],"tags":[],"kateb":[728],"class_list":["post-17732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics-en","kateb-shimaa-hamdy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/\u0645\u0628\u0627\u0631\u0643.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17732"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17732\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24168,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17732\/revisions\/24168"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17732"},{"taxonomy":"kateb","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zawia3.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/kateb?post=17732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}