There has been increasing talk in Egypt recently about the Sisi regime's intention to sell the Suez Canal to foreign investors (often investors from the Gulf kingdoms, and they may have strong ties to Israel) in order to obtain a few billion dollars, to pay off Egypt's debts caused by the policies of the dictator Sisi himself.
Al-Sisi, who follows the method of shock doctrine, relying on repression, killing and arresting all who oppose him, was not afraid of anything, nor was he afraid of the popular reaction rejecting this crime that reminds of the crime of Khedive Ismail in the past, when he also sold the Suez Canal to pay off the debts caused by his policies. And the subsequent British occupation of Egypt.
Al-Sisi justifies the plans to sell the canal by the need for economically troubled countries to have collateral savings. He said, during the opening of two factories in the Chemical Industries Complex in Giza, that “when he asked Lieutenant General Osama Rabie (head of the Suez Canal Authority) in 2019 about the funds the authority has, he replied that there are no funds, so Sisi asked him: What do you do when you want to implement a project to develop Suez Canal, Lieutenant General Rabie replied that he is asking the Ministry of Finance, and that this is the system followed.
With regard to the Suez Canal law approved by Sisi’s parliament, it is, in short, the establishment of a fund owned by the authority that allows it to buy, sell and lease assets, and of course the funds remain with a special budget outside the general budget.
Al-Sisi’s justification, and what has been reported recently in Egypt about the imminent sale of the Suez Canal, days after the announcement of the International Monetary Fund’s approval of a new loan for Egypt. All this makes us ask the question in the title: Did Sisi decide to sell the Suez Canal, instead of removing the army from the economy?
Satisfying the Egyptian army and the IMF
The IMF required Egypt to fully liberalize the exchange rate of the Egyptian pound against the dollar, and remove the army from the economy, in order to grant Egypt a new loan. Negotiations were so faltering that the fund's agenda in December did not include Egypt when it was announced.
Then we were surprised by the inclusion of Egypt on the agenda, and the approval of a loan of $3 billion, with promises from international donors of about $14 billion more.
Then came the announcement of an Egyptian plan to sell the Suez Canal. And the talk about the condition of fully liberalizing the exchange rate and removing the Egyptian army from the economy was reduced!
The sequence of events is like this, with the Biden administration's remarkable satisfaction with Trump's "favorite dictator" and what that means (and also coincides with it) in terms of a change in the position of the IMF (the United States' plundering arm) on Egypt. All of this suggests that an agreement was reached to satisfy everyone: Al-Sisi gets the loan without prejudice to the army’s economy, and the plundering system represented by the IMF will get ownership of an important shipping lane like the Suez Canal.
Sisi and the people.. and the shock doctrine
Some get excited and say that selling the Suez Canal will be the "straw" that will break the back of the Sisi regime!! I do not know, how can they underestimate a major disaster such as selling the canal, to the point of turning it into a "straw"?!
The sale will take place, just as the land (Tiran and Sanafir), the Nile (the Renaissance Dam) and Egypt’s rights in the eastern Mediterranean (gas fields and border demarcation) were forfeited, with the support, consent, protection and blessing of the Egyptian army. The popular response will suffice with silence, and in the best case, the excitement will be limited to hashtags on social networking sites.
For the people who did not move a finger to forfeit the Nile (which means that they would die of thirst), we do not expect any action from them now. And the army has a well-known history of negligence.. It began in 1977 and continues until the moment of collapse.. The collapse of Egypt or the collapse of the army itself!
What is worth noting is that the dates of the betrayals of Sisi and the Camp David army are all indicative. The decision to sell the Suez Canal coincides with the 23rd of December... the anniversary of the end of the Suez War, which was due to the decision to nationalize the Suez Canal and its Egyptianization in 1956!
That is, Sisi - the loyal son of the military establishment and the best that the Egyptian army has to offer to rule Egypt - sells the national historical symbolism within the system of selling Egyptian land and investment assets. The most important thing is that this sale takes place with the consent, approval, protection, blessing and support of the Egyptian army.
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