Is the head of the House committee investigating this season’s wheat harvest overdoing it a little? “Fraud in the domestic wheat harvest will not be less that EGP 4 bn,” said Magdy Malak, head of the House of Representatives committee investigating allegations that wheat when missing during the harvest — or that state officials faked the final count. In an extensive interview with Al Borsa, Malak said that as much as 2-2.25 mn tonnes of wheat is “missing” from the 4.8 mn tonnes reportedly collected. Malak said the committee has so far identified EGP 560 mn in discrepancies between official tallies and stores on hand at 10 sites it has visited (out of an estimated 135 silos). Grandstanding by committee members including Malak has increased since the investigation began and has taken on a new tone since the Prosecutor General’s Office issued arrests warrants in connection with the scandal on Sunday.

Malak attacked the state-owned General Company for Silos and Storage (GCSS) for relying on the private sector. Some 3 mn tonnes of the 4.8 mn tonne harvest were stored in privately-owned silos, while 80% of government silos remain empty. “We will push for the punishment of the body that failed to properly utilize the 93 facilities built by Blumberg Grain,” said Malak, in a not so veiled reference to the GCSS. Malak tempered his tone but also criticized the Planning Ministry and what he said was its failure to act on allegations that the smart card system had been hacked, blaming it for depending on “unreliable companies.”

Visa is offering to help with the supply and bread smart card system, a senior company executive told Supply Minister Khaled Hanafy yesterday. Tarek El Husseiny, Visa’s GM for North-West & Central Africa, is said to have offered to work with other smart card companies already contracted by the Planning Ministry to develop a secure and complete electronic financial system for the distribution of supplies and bread subsidies, according to a ministry readout on the meeting carried by AMAY.