Supply Minister Ali El Moselhy’s recent changes to the bread subsidy system and subsequent protests were the talk of the town last night (more in the Speed Round), receiving sharp criticism from Kol Youm’s Amr Adib, who said that the decision did not take people’s needs into account or factor in the harshness of current economic conditions on the average citizen. “Bread is all that people have now,” he said (watch, runtime 2:19).

El Moselhy defended his decision in an interview with Yahduth fi Masr’s Sherif Amer, explaining that the golden card was meant to be employed in exceptional cases. El Moselhy said he had discovered serious fraud and that the system needed to be tightly monitored.

El Moselhy repeated his statements to DMC’s Osama Kamal, who also hosted the minister for the evening. “I’ve been in this job for two weeks and I decided to tackle this casefile because it wastes a lot of money” (watch, runtime 5:00). He also told Kamal that he would never enforce any major changes to the subsidy system without first consulting with the people through the House of Representatives and industry groups and members (watch, runtime 4:13).

Meanwhile on Hona Al Assema, Lamees El Hadidy jumped on the grandstanding bandwagon and criticized the government for not giving people prior notice, but advised everyone — after reassuring them that their bread rations remain unchanged — to not be so quick to join the rumor mill (watch, runtime 57:32). MP Anisa Hassoussa, who phoned into the show, concurred, saying that El Moselhy’s press conference should have been held before the decision was made official (watch, runtime 2:46).

The host also spoke to the head of the bakeries division in Alexandria, Abdel Aal Darwish, who told her that 75% of subsidy beneficiaries in the city are not smart card holders. “We were hoping that the Supply Minister was going to give people smart cards first before enforcing this new decision,” he said. MP Ali El Kayal told Lamees that El Moselhy’s undersecretary confirmed that some 54,800 smart cards will be handed to people in Minya within 48 hours, and that other governorates would also follow suit (watch, runtime 4:42).