The State Budget of the Egyptian Kingdom in 1948-1949

These are scans from Al-Mussawar Magazine in its golden days in year 1948. Please click the scans to see much better.

The state’s budget ; where it comes from and where it goes with a complete easy illustration to make the citizen understand the sources and allocations of the budget.

It was not hard or sophisticated ,in fact it was simplified to the simple reader to know all what he wanted about the State’s budge.

First of all you must remember that this budget was before the nationalization of the Suez Canal , second it was the war’s year in 1948. Yes this was our budget during the war year. I think this budget was prepared either by Mahmoud Fahmi El-Nukrashi Pasha cabinet or Ibrahim Abdel Hadi Pasha cabinet. “El-Nukrashi was assassinated in 1948”

The total state budget in fiscal year 1948-1949 was L.E  183,435,100 “Without the Suez Canal nor oil and gas exports  nor tourism nor Egyptian expats !!”

The main sources of revenues at that time were : “Main sources of income”

• Customs “ More than L.E 56 Million”
• The inheritance tax “I do not know much about it but I believe it is based upon the inherited properties during that time before the nationalisation laws

Now the main allocations at that time were :

• Defending Palestine “ L.E 30,000,000”  {I doubt any Arab country in that allocation that sum of money to defend Palestine}
• The war ministry budget “L.E 20 Million”
• The transportation ministry budget “ L.E 18 Million”

And the big surprise to me and the big shock to all those who attacked the Royal family during that time.

• The least allocation in the State budget of the Egyptian kingdom was the Royal allocation !! It was only “L.E  1,038,251” !! Can someone please tell how much are the Presidential allocations in the state’s annual budget now !!!?? King Farouk had a fight with the Wafd cabinet in order to buy a new bed room to Queen Nariman  when he married her , he wanted to have a loan for his next year royal allocations and they refused it !!

This is the Royal Family that was always accused to be thieves who were sucking the blood of the poor people !!!

This budget was made during a tough war and surprisingly there was no deficit and the internal debt was only 5 million !! Again there was no National Suez Canal Company , there were no oil and gas and there were no tourism industry like now !!!  I forget to say that the Egyptian pound during that time was much powerful than US dollar  !!

In 2008-2009 state budget there is a deficit equal to L.E 82 Billion “$ 15.2 Billion” !! Do not tell me that we are 80 million Egyptians now because in 1948 they did not have as much productive resources as we do now !! Do give me lessons about the changes in economy and history and how Egypt has suffered from wars simply because Mubarak has ruled  a normal peaceful stable Egypt  for more than 25 years !!

Photos : From Amir Sisi Flickr ‘s scans collection.

Technorati Tags: Citizen Journalism,Egypt,Economy,Life,Egyptian Royalty,King Farouk,History,National,Politics,Palestine,1948,1949,State budget,Mideast,Middle East