Floating Egypt

It was Black Thursday, as the Egyptians called it, when they woke up to the news of the Egyptian Pound being floated, or rather assassinated, causing it to lose over half of its value. This was after a lowly deception of the Egyptians took place, as the night before, the government’s media machines were reporting that the value of the US dollar was falling against the Egyptian Pound. They even decreased the dollar’s purchasing power, making it 13 pounds, so the people quickly exchanged their dollars out of fear of the following decline as they were warned that the dollar would continue to decline.

After the banks’ vaults were full of dollars, they surprised everyone with their decision to float the pound on the next day, making it 18 pounds on average! The government didn’t wait for the people to get over their shock in the morning, as it shocked them against in the evening with its decision to raise the fuel prices, such as gas and diesel. This caused the immediate increase in the prices of all food and non-food goods.

The timing of these decisions was very striking and raises a number of questions regarding how these decisions are being made before November 11th, which is the day that the Egyptians were invited to revolt. This scares the government, and Al-Sisi himself even issued a warning during a speech that he would deploy the troops across the country within 6 hours, and some of the troops have already been deployed in preparation for this day and the security forces have already began arresting a number of young activists.

The explanation that I am leaning towards is that Al-Sisi underestimates the Egyptian people and believes he can use his military and security forces to intimidate them and deter them. He quickly imposed his disastrous decisions on Egypt and the Egyptians in order to implement the terms of the IMF and receive the loan, and this will actually occur in the coming hours.

Al-Sisi has come to destroy Egypt and the decision o float the pound is a translation and manifestation of this. The value of the economy in any country is measured by the value of its currency and its stability in the market. However, after this move, the international markets are excluding the Egyptian pound from circulation. Egypt’s budget is also facing the burdens of repaying loans and their interests.

Egypt has been witnessing an economic disaster since the day of the brutal coup, and it is also experiencing other catastrophes despite the fact that it has taken nearly $60 billion from the Gulf States, but no one knows where this money has gone. The miserable situation Egypt’s economy is going through has cause many factories to stop its work and resulted in many companies shutting down. This is in addition to a number of international companies leaving Egypt of course due to the lack of tourism, leading to more unemployment, a stall in the labour market, and a decline in the import of dollars into the state treasury. Things have reached the extent of medical companies stopping the importation of medication, causing a serious medication crisis in private hospitals and pharmacies. Insulin has disappeared, while dialysis has ended due to a lack of medical supplies.

There is a state of general grievance and anger in the Egyptian streets and everyone is waiting for November 11th as they believe it is the day of salvation from this corrupt and oppressive government. However, I doubt this, we do not know the number of people who will responds to calls for revolt and no one knows who is behind the call. Al-Sisi managed to take the people back into the confines of fear by means of the strength of bullets, but lets see what happens.

Tomorrow is close if we have patience.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.