Given the lack of progress, it was bound to happen: The Armed Forces have taken control of the nation’s smart-card subsidy system, Al Shorouk reports.Cabinet positioned the move as a bid to “develop the system, which aims to ease pressure on citizens and provide the best service,” Reuters reports. We see this not as a power play by the military, but a frank acknowledgement that the program has failed after years to get off the ground, lacking so much as a standard roll of qualified beneficiaries, despite multiple announcements over the past two years that the database had been purged of duplicates and dead people.