Wednesday, June 15, 2011

The Madinat El Salam sit in : Where is everybody !?

In another development today at the Madinet El Salam sit in at ERTVU building , the protesters decided to cut the Corniche way in Cairo in an attempt to grab the attention of the government , the media and the society.

Of course the people of Cairo are blaming and attacking those who cut the roads but did anyone try to listen to the Madinat El Salam’s people for real. Yes we all know that they want new homes , new apartments to live instead of sleeping in the street like that and yes there are millions like them who need real homes suitable for humans but why no one is doing something to help these people from the civil society !?

Already I know their story and some people I met are saying that these citizens got apartments which they sold and now they want new apartments. Of course as you will see in the video which I shot with my mobile phone below that the ladies are denying these claims totally , why would they sleep in the street if they have got money !?

The protesters of Madinat El Salam speak up

But where are the human rights organizations !? Where are those political activists and presidential candidates !? It is not only the government’s role.

One of the ladies I saw today from Madinat El Salam wondered why the people supported the Christians sit in at ERTVU building and the government listened to these Christians and built a new church while the government is totally ignoring them. This is very dangerous , truly dangerous.

It is worth to mention that one of the protesters at the sit in drowned at the Nile last Saturday when he was washing up there while a lady protester was hit by Cairo’s governor car !! The governor tried to compensate both the family of the late protester and the lady he hit with his car with apartments. The lady and the family of the late protesters refused amazingly and made it that it was either apartments for all the protesters or they won’t leave.

One of the ladies told me that a man was allegedly hit by an army vehicle but I could not get a confirmation.

One of the ladies also asked me about these billions Egypt got and where our share from these billions. You must know many Egyptians think in this way.

Again I wonder the role of Egyptian human rights organizations , civil societies , the political parties and potential presidential candidates from Madinat El Salam sit in.

6 comments:

  1. yes I am wondering why??..why is the media ignoring this???..why??..why we don't organize a friday to support them...as we claim we did this revolution to support the less fortunate,,here they are suffering,,,where are our role??,,I hope they never leave,,until they take their rights !

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  2. Back at the beginning of March when I first heard about the "tent people" in Salam City, I was told that Essam Sharaf had personally been given a guarantee by the governor of Cairo that these people would all be provided with low-rent apartments within 8 weeks.

    At the time, it was still bitterly cold and the more than 1500 families were crowded into thin tents with not even enough blankets to cover the dusty ground, let alone to cover themselves with. I called a few friends and we bought 600 blankets, which I personally took to Salam City, which gave me a chance to talk to the people there.

    I came away amazed at the courage, resilience and intelligence of these beautiful people -- in their situation, I think I would have gone mad.

    Since then, I've spoken to many journalists and others who confirmed that the governor has at his disposal more than 11,000 empty low-rent apartments in Cairo built with public funds especially for cases like these. Instead, under the "previous"/current regime, these apartments are deliberately kept empty so they can be used as bribes to be exchanged for personal favors by corrupt officials.

    Every single one of these families has provided all the documentation necessary to prove that they are eligible to be housed in these apartments. Background checks have been done on all the cases.

    There is NO REASON for the governor to refuse to hand over the apartments. They are not his father's apartments and they were not built with his father's money, but with the people's money precisely to house the poor and vulnerable.

    We can learn a lot from listening to these people, our fellow Egyptians: to us, corruption means having to pay a bribe or reading headlines about billions of dollars stolen.

    But they know from direct experience that corruption is a ravenous monster that eats human flesh and drinks the blood of their precious children and that society's indifference is the oxygen it breathes.

    By refusing to do his job and hand over the apartments, the governor is coldly condemning thousands of people to unbelievable suffering and some of them to death. There are elderly people and small children whose health has deteriorated severely after a freezing winter exposed to the cold wind and rain and now a stifling summer in which the only choice is either to suffocate in the tents or be scorched by the merciless sun.

    Recently a young girl was raped by one of the Military Police who are surrounding the camp in Salam City. I wasn't totally surprised: one of the many things that shocked me was the total contempt, even hatred that was expressed by the army officers assigned to the camp. Before I went in, many of them told me with a straight face: "Don't believe them, they're well off -- some of them are richer than you!" With their words still echoing in my ears, I stepped into the camp and it was like walking into hell. Other than the thin, flimsy tents, there is nothing. Just thousands of people, citizens with rights, slowly fading away, as the governor and their fellow citizens ignore them.

    It's been four months now. With a stroke of his pen, the governor could save these people's lives, but he chooses not to. The only reason he's allowed to get away with this criminal abuse of power is that we let him. When he lies and says that he has handed over "hundreds of apartments", nobody confronts him with the truth.

    There has been some media coverage, but most of it focuses on the terrible conditions in which these people are forced to live. The real story is the governor's criminal actions and the deeply-rooted corruption that lies behind them, and that has not changed at all since February 11.

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  3. Explain, why they should give the apartment? Take them home and feed the spare!

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  4. The Arab states have their political leadership, armed forces and security systems briefs mixed up. They all should serve the people, instead, the Armed forces in any Arab state are there only to promote and protect their own self interest. Leaders of any Arab state's only objective is to serve their own interest by promoting, protecting and preserving their autocratic regimes.
    The security forces of any Arab state has one and only one interest, that is to protect and preserve autocratic regimes from the people.
    Do you know any Arab country which does not follow the three above models? if yes, name one.

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  5. "Do you know any Arab country which does not follow the three above models? if yes, name one. "

    Lebanon

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  6. No sir, Lebanon is a victim like the rest of them, think hard and you will see why.

    ReplyDelete

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