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Wednesday, 2 May 2018

Amr Adib resigns, Thanaweya Amma gets new facelift

Amr Adib resigns? Kol Youm’s Amr Adib announced his sudden resignation on Monday night’s episode, wrapping up what was quite a colorful c. 20 years as a broadcaster. Adib offered no explanation to why he will no longer be hosting the show, only saying that he had been wanting to retire for the past seven months, but had stayed on the request of the network. Adib had briefly left the show after suffering some minor health issues last year. Adib will host his final episode in “mid-May,” which we’re taking to be 15 May, when the talking heads go on their Ramadan break (watch, runtime: 10:14). From getting econ wrong, to getting (some) politics right, and entertaining comments in between, he will be missed. We wish the host had given us prior warning to come up with some highlights. We instead leave you with this Lionel Messi interview from last year that made his day.

As for the rest of the airwaves, primary and middle school education is going the way of Thanaweya Amma and getting a major revamp. Education Minister Tarek Shawky made the rounds on the airwaves last night to outline the new system, which is expected to be implemented in September during the 2018-19 academic year.

The new primary school system aims to make teaching subjects, including STEM, in English mandatory for all public middle schools (grades 7-9), Shawky said, Al Masry Al Youm reports. The move is meant to have public education compete with the language schools and the international schools. Primary school education in public schools will be taught in Arabic. The philosophy of doing away with rote memorization, which the ministry is planning to implement for Thanaweya Amma, seems to be at play in these reforms, as it plans to end exams for students below the third grade. Shawky noted that these reforms will not apply to private and international schools.

The new system will be introduced to students entering Kindergarten and will not impact current primary school students, Shawky tells Hona Al Asema (watch, runtime: 6:41). MP Mohammed Al Aakad called in to voice his criticism that the new system came as a surprise and that the ministry should have launched in a “national dialogue” before introducing it (watch, runtime: 8:48).

Contrary to official press releases, meetings between President Abdel Fattah El Sisi and his Cypriot and Greek counterparts did look at energy cooperation, Ittihadeya spokesman Bassan Rady tells Yahduth fi Masr (watch, runtime: 6:33). He then delved into the cultural aspects of the visit without elaborating further. Expectations were for an agreement to be signed this week, in light of Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and his Greek counterpart Prokopis Pavlopoulos’ visit to Cairo for the “Week to Revive the Roots” cultural forum. Egypt and Cyprus had reached a preliminary agreement to build an underwater pipeline for the transfer of natural gas. The move is expected to put Egypt on the map as a regional hub for the processing and export of natural gas to Europe and could see the country receive mns in funding from the EU under an energy cooperation framework signed last week. An Egyptian-Cypriot-Greek business forum was also held yesterday in Alexandria, according to a Trade Ministry statement.

EFA blames the media for its own lack of class: Egyptian Football Association (EFA) board member Khaled Latif blamed the media for blowing the dispute over Mohamed Salah’s image rights in an interview with Yahduth fi Masr (watch, runtime: 1:15). The issue is topping coverage of Egypt in the News.

On the weather, expect it to get better before it gets worse: Meteorological Authority head Ahmed Abdel Aal told Hona Al Asema that dust and sandstorms will begin to subside in some areas over the coming days but temperature will gradually rise reaching some 40 C in Cairo by Friday (watch, runtime: 5:37).

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