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Wednesday, 13 October 2021

El Sisi’s day in Budapest kept the talking heads busy + football season kicks off

President Abdel Fattah El Sisi’s day in Budapest was front and center on the airwaves last night. Sada El Balad (watch, runtime: 1:16), El Hayah El Youm (watch, runtime: 5:40), Kelma Akhira (watch, runtime: 2:44), and DMC (watch, runtime: 8:01) all aired highlights of the president’s speech during the Visegrad (V4) summit, which we recap in full in Diplomacy, below.

Al Hayah Al Youm’s Moustafa Sherdy and Ala Mas’ouleety’s Ahmed Moussa spoke to pundits to discuss the bigger picture. The talking heads noted that Egypt is uniquely placed as the only country from the region to take part in the closed summit and discussed the political implications of taking part (watch, runtime: 11:12 and runtime: 7:58). Moussa also phoned Presidential Spokesperson Bassem Rady for a recap of the day (watch, runtime: 5:22).

What’s the Visegrad Group? Think of it as the “Big Four” of central Europe: Members include the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Hungary.

Inflation was another topic of note last night: Spiraling energy and commodity prices worldwide, which are beginning to translate into higher headline inflation domestically, were the key discussion point in a phone call between Moussa and cabinet spokesperson Nader Saad (watch, runtime: 4:48 and runtime: 2:27).

Are importers going to get a break? Moussa asked Saad whether officials are mulling lower customs rates to limit the effect of global inflation at home. According to Saad, this is still not on the agenda, with authorities currently only focused on maintaining strategic stockpiles of key commodities to boost supply when needed (watch, runtime: 1:47).

The Egyptian Premier League draw as the nation braces for the start of the 2021-2022 football season, also made the rounds. You can watch the full event here (runtime: 38:25).

Speaking of football, the upcoming season will see the return of live fans to stadiums for the first time since covid. Attendance will be limited to 2000 per stadium under an agreement reached with the Interior Ministry, Ahmed Diab, the head of the association of pro Egyptian clubs said during the draw (watch, runtime: 6:08).

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