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Wednesday, 14 February 2018

Hesham Genena’s detention leads the conversation on the airwaves

The arrest of former state corruption watchdog Hesham Genena on the order of military prosecutors led the conversation on the airwaves last night.

Retired Egyptian general and Qatari intelligence bureau founder Mohamed Mansour almost immediately accused Genena of treason in remarks to Al Hayah Al Youm’s Nahawand Serry, claiming Genena is funded by “conspirators” trying to damage Egypt. (watch, runtime 7:47).

Kol Youm’s Amr Adib slammed the notion that Genena’s arrest could be at all related to the upcoming presidential election. Adib also said that Genena’s statements to the press, in which he claimed to have incriminating evidence against several top military generals, only served to further complicate things for him and his presidential candidate of choice, former military chief of staff Sami Anan (watch, runtime 4:06).

Masaa DMC’s Osama Kamal echoed Adib’s thoughts, pointing out that Anan has denied the verity of Genena’s claims, which, if true, would further incriminate Anan and Genena along with him (watch, runtime 11:50).

Kamal then shifted his attention to the newly-passed Capital Markets Act (full story in Speed Round, below). MP Ahmed Khalil Khairallah of the Islamist Al Nour Party said the law will play an important role in improving Egypt’s economy (watch, runtime 3:40). Brilliant analysis.

Yahduth fi Masr’s Sherif Amer also zeroed in on economic legislation with Customs Authority head Magdy Abdel Aziz explaining that the amendments to the Customs Act will tighten regulations on temporary exemptions from duties (watch, runtime 2:16).

Over on Hona Al Asema, Lamees Al Hadidi spoke to Misr Insurance Holding Company Chairman Mohamed Youssef about President Abdel Fattah El Sisi’s proposed life insurance scheme for private sector workers. Youssef said that banks are working on launching EGP 500 CDs with yields of 16% that will act as life insurance policies and pay EGP 10-50k in cases of natural death and up to EGP 200k in accidents. Each individual will be allowed to buy up to five certificates, he said (watch, runtime 10:29).

Youssef also phoned in to Masaa DMC for a similar conversation (watch, runtime 4:32).

Lamees also had a chat with Electricity Ministry spokesman Ayman Hamza, who explained that intermittent power outages hitting 6 October City are the result of grid upgrades being carried out to accommodate the area’s growing population and power needs. Work should be complete by mid-2018, Hamza said, noting that similar upgrades will be carried out in various areas across the country during the course of the year (watch, runtime 5:34).

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