By Mahmoud Basiony, head of the Arabic Network for Digital Media and Human Rights
Ten years ago, Egyptians demanded "social justice" in January 25th revolution. It was the most dominant slogan raised in Tahrir Square, which grabbed the attention of most experts and analysts. The truth is that social justice was not a part of the plans of the Egyptian state before 2013. The absence of social justice has obviously spread. Among its most dangerous manifestations were the spread of slums in the main cities, the increase in the gap between classes (the gap between rich people and poor people) and the absence of social protection programs and efficient health services.
It was clear that there was a disconnection between the Egyptian state’s orientations at that time and what the United Nations had stated; the United Nations had established the concept of social justice at the beginning of the new millennium as a basic principle of peaceful coexistence through the state’s distribution of the benefits and burdens of society, achieving development and preserving human dignity through an economic and social system that aims to eliminate the large economic differences among the classes of society.
Brotherhood empowerment
After the events of January 25th, there were a major crisis as a result of the chaos that befell the country and affected the performance of the government and state institutions and the emergence of the desire of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is classified as a terrorist group in a number of countries of the world, to have power alone through monopolizing leadership positions, excluding other political and social tendencies, persecution of Copts, attacks on churches and places of worship, and besieging Supreme Constitutional Court and Media Production City to stop any objection of their empowerment plan. As a result, the country faced danger, high rates of poverty , unemployment, and the disappearance of any citizen protection programs.
As a result of this failure to fulfill the demands of the Egyptians during their uprising on January 25th, the people revolted again in search of social justice in the June 30th Revolution. Egyptians decided political adjustment and eliminated the manifestations of pision on the basis of sectarian and the threat of terrorism and monopoly of power.
Concept settlement
For any country to achieve social justice, it is crucial to have a total developmental process on the political, economic and social aspects. Political development requires forming institutions which can cope up with the changes in the country. They also have to motivate the public, the governmental institutions and non-governmental ones to do their best to achieve social justice. The matter does not differ much in economic development, where the intention to establish social justice must be matched by an economic development process that can provide the needs of the different classes, especially the lower ones with regard to support and other programs, as a condition for the success of social justice and the existence of community development so that the classes of society can absorb the coming waves of change.
The state of June 30 began a new path to settle the concept of social justice through constitutional articles that guarantee social justice for all citizens and non-discrimination among them, and that discrimination is based only on efficiency in the 2014 constitution.
The previous 2015 Parliament of Egypt issued a number of laws that achieve the concept of social justice on the ground. Most notably is the law No. 104 of 2015 regarding achieving tax justice, law No. 242 of 2011 regarding the maximum income and linking it to the minimum, law No. 67of 2016 and the issuance of the added value tax law, the civil service law 81 No. of 2016 and law No. 60 issued in the same year, regarding increasing pensions and amending some of social insurance laws. Also, the Full Health Insurance Law No. 2 of 2018, which stated in its texts that it is a compulsory system, based on social solidarity which covers all citizens participating in the system, and the state bears its costs for those who are unable, based on a decision issued by the Prime Minister defining the exemption conditions.
Egypt's Vision 2030
In February 2016, the vision of Egypt 2030 emerged. It is a national agenda which was declared in February 2016. It reflects the country's long term strategic plan to achieve the goals and standards of sustainable development upon all aspects and to apply these standards in various Egyptian bodies. This agenda pais special attention to social justice, to raise the quality of citizens' life and to improve people's standard of living. The second goal of the vision stated that importance of justice, social harmony and participation. It emphasized that the vision aims at achieving equality of rights and opportunities, promoting financial inclusion, empowering of women, youth and the most groups in need, supporting the participation of all groups in development, and enhancing the spirit of loyalty and belonging to the Egyptian identity.
Slums housing
Egypt had suffered for many years from the lack of justice in the distribution of wealth and the widening of the gaps between the rich and the poor, which gave the state the responsibility of restoring balance to achieve social justice. Indeed, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, after assuming power, gave special attention to the issue of slums, which previous governments neglected for 30 years. In a promising plan to develop unsafe areas, which began with the Nahdet Al-Mahrousa project, Asmarat neighborhood, and the development of Maspero, Bashayer Al-Khair and Alexandria, where the Bashayer Al-Khair 1 project was inaugurated in Alexandria in December 2016. It was established on an area of 12.5 acres to serve ten thousand citizens. It consists of 17 residential buildings, one of the slum developmental projects.
In 2016, President El-Sisi inaugurated the first and second phases of the Asmarat housing project in the Mokattam district The city of Asmarat appeared in three stages; the first, most important and largest projects for the development of slums, which have accommodated more than 15 thousand families so far, as 3 stages were established in the city of Asmarat on an area of 185 acres. Almost completely completed, the first and second phases were occupied, and housing is underway in the third phase, which was also completed, with a total of 18420 housing units for the whole project.
In December 2018, President Al-Sisi inaugurated the Bashayer Al-Khair 2 project in Alexandria, in the "Gheit Al-Enab" area, west of Alexandria, to receive hundreds of families from slums in 1869 new housing units, costing about 625 million pounds, and 1632 housing units were delivered during the first phase. The second phase included the construction of 18 blocks and inpidual buildings, with a total of 37 buildings, including 1869 housing units, with an area of 100 square meters for each apartment.
According to the data of the Slums Development Fund, it has completed the development of 188 unsafe areas containing 105,328 units, and the development of another 90 areas with 90,466 units is underway, in addition to the completion of the development of 52 unplanned areas, and another 18 areas with 284,108 units are being developed.
There were also 18 slum markets. Other 26 projects are being developed with 3645 units. On the other hand, 70 projects are being executed, which are 11 projects to develop 27 unsafe areas. The state developed the Maspero Triangle project by removing informal areas and creating alternative areas for the people.
Decent life
Social security is one of the basic pillars of social justice. Social security includes the right to obtain benefits or guarantees and so on. The philosophy of that is the attempt to strengthen the bond among people and reduce the gaps between them without discrimination. It also includes several things from examples, providing financial aid to the neediest inpiduals in society, providing quality health care to all levels of society and ensuring inpiduals who were born into poor classes to provide them with effective education and decent work.
President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi launched several initiatives to implement the concepts of social security and various health protection programs. The beginning was with the Takaful and Karama project, which is a conditional cash transfer program under the umbrella of developing social safety nets. Then he launched a decent life initiative in which the state cooperates with the private sector and civil society and that came to fulfill what was stated in the texts of the International Covenant on Economic and Social Rights, such as the human right to adequate housing, the right to obtain good services, and a successful deal with poverty and unemployment.
A few days ago, the second phase of the project, which received previous UN commendations encouragement having to 50 centers nationwide with a total of 1381. The state provided about 500 billion pounds to develop villages in the governorates and 232 villages were initially targeted, but the president directed work in 50 centers in the various governorates around the country, with a total of 1,381 villages. He decided to personally follow up its implementation stages.
The initiative is based on supporting economic empowerment projects and providing job opportunities as well as micro-projects within the framework of strengthening the social protection network of the most vulnerable families. Also, as caring for people with disabilities and providing integrated services cards for them with intensifying awareness programs and expanding literacy classes and launching convoys for early detection of disability for children under 5 years in the various targeted villages.
The president also responded to the Egyptian judiciary’s ruling by including the five bonuses owed to pensioners at 80% of the basic wage. Thus, the president triumphed for pensioners whose case had been deliberated for years without a response.
Developing villages most in need
In January 2021, President El-Sisi launched the first phase of a decent life project to improve the quality of life in the Egyptian villages. The goal was to develop the villages most in need and provide resources in all geographical areas in the rural area and urban alike.
The government announced that it has spent about 5.8 trillion pounds since July 2014 on the development of the infrastructure of the villages and that it has allocated half a trillion pounds for the development of the villages of the Egyptian countryside within the project. This is carried out through coordination and unification of efforts among state institutions, private sector institutions, civil society and development partners.
The project seeks to urgently interfere to improve the quality of life for the citizens of the Egyptian countryside and to work to improve the quality of life in 4,584 villages, including roads, transportation, sanitation, drinking water, electricity and lighting, natural gas, development of local units, youth, sports, health and educational services. This is as well as an integrated package of services that includes various health and social aspects. The first phase of the project includes the development of the villages most in need. It is urgent to target developing more than 1000 poor villages, and the total of the beneficiaries reaches 50 million citizens.
Poverty rates decreased
A few days ago, the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics announced that poverty rates in Egypt decreased to 29.7% during the year 2019/2020, compared to 32.5% in the 2017/2018 research. After the social protection projects launched by President El-Sisi during the past five years was implemented, on top of which was the Takaful and Dignity program, support and support for breadwinning women. This led to an increase in the average annual income of the family from 60 thousand pounds annually to more than 69 thousand pounds annually.
The family's logistical support, from which about 70 million citizens benefit, has contributed to a significant decline in poverty rates, the most important sign is the recording of the average family raise to be 1,420 pounds. The fuel support has had the greatest impact on supporting Egyptian families in rural areas with an estimated support of 1527 pounds annually, for the family and 1944 pounds to as support of the electricity.
He pointed to the success of the Takaful and Karama program, from which more than 3 million citizens benefit, and which is considered among the most important government programs that have led to decrease the level of poverty in Egypt. This reflects the success of the state’s efforts to target the most vulnerable families since the program began.
The report emphasized that what Egyptians spend on buying food, which reached 31.1% of their total annual income, confirms that poverty rates have decreased to a level that has not happened in 20 years, and that this is linked to increased wages and job opportunities in the Egyptian market.
Health protection programs
Human development indicators are among the basic indicators used to measure the status of social justice, on top of which are the outputs of health systems. The most important indicators are, such as, maternal and maternal mortality rates, infant and child mortality rates, and life-years rates) in human development indicators, in addition to indicators of access to drinking water and others. It makes health a vital measure for ensuring the right tio development and social justice.
With the emergence of the comprehensive health organization project, the state began to extend the health umbrella to all its citizens alike. It was preceded by several initiatives launched by President Al-Sisi, such as the 100 million health initiative, free treatment of C virus, ending waiting lists in hospitals, and then dealing seriously with the Corona pandemic according to the available capabilities.
According to this vision, we can achieve a great progress in which the Egyptian state responded to the demands of the Egyptian people for social justice and began to implement it according to its modern concept established by the United Nations and defined by international human rights standards for the quality of life for the citizen.
Fighting the Coronavirus
Egypt's preparations for the Corona virus pandemic began as soon as it appeared in China. It allocated 100 billion pounds for efforts to confront the repercussions of the Corona virus and reduce the burden on citizens. With the start of the second wave, President Al-Sisi directed the strengthening of the financial support package to counter the negative effects of this epidemic.
With the beginning of the pandemic, the state prepared hospitals, medicines or medical supplies. The state also converted 77 hospitals in all governorates into isolation hospitals, and Egypt had a sufficient number of ventilators. Emphasizes the need to adhere to the precautionary measures, which contributed to limiting the spread of the first wave and its crossing the first wave with a small number of injuries.
In the second wave, December 2020 until the beginning of January 2021, and the numbers began to decrease several days ago, the state resorted to reducing the density in public places, institutions and workplaces, whether governmental or private. This greatly helped to reduce the number of injured people recently without resorting to complete closure in order to preserve stable economic growth rates and a complete the path of improving living conditions.
With the emergence of the vaccine, Egypt obtained an amount of the vaccine and began to give it to medical teams in isolation and chest hospitals, the elderly and the first groups. It also contracted to provide the vaccine from several sources to obtain the new Corona virus vaccines, and it contracted on 20 million doses of the vaccine.
Improving the environment
Egypt has placed attention to the environmental dimension within the path of social justice and improvement of the public health of citizens set by the government. At the forefront is covering canals and drains within residential blocks, disposing of hazardous health waste and improving water quality.
The government has increased the number of ambient air quality monitoring stations to 104 monitoring stations nationwide. While it aims to reach 120 stations by 2030. The number of industrial establishments linked to the national network for monitoring industrial emissions which reached 68 facilities and 291 monitoring points. With the aim of reducing solid particulate pollution by 50%.
In addition, the National Council for Climate Change was reconfigured under the lead of the Prime Minister and the membership of a group of concerned ministers. The council is concerned with formulating strategies and climate change policies in Egypt. Egypt also succeeded in reducing noise levels after the establishment of the National Network for Monitoring Noise Levels, which currently consists of 35 stations.
In the field of clean energy, Egypt has implemented the largest solar power plant in the world, "Benban Station" in Aswan, which is one of the best projects in the world according to the World Bank, and is considered one of the world capitals for solar energy. It includes the largest number of power stations, totaling 40 stations. Sharm el-Sheikh has been transformed into a green city, to be the first Egyptian, Arab, African and Middle Eastern city to bear this characteristic according to international standards, in addition to the cities of El Alamein, the administrative capital, the Grand Museum and others. Theses cities will become an environmental model. Government has internal financial policies that stimulate and support environmentally friendly enterprises, and intensify the penalties imposed against violations and wrong environmental practices.
Conclusion
According to these facts and paths, we can monitor the course of the development of social justice in Egypt and the existence of a vision and political will implement and integrate the concept of social justice in Egypt despite the economic challenges and the global crisis of the Corona pandemic. The state has mobilized all its capabilities to respond to the demands of the Egyptian people to achieve social justice and reduce class gaps in good management of resources and attention to justice distributing them to the population in a way that maintains stability and community security and ensures its sustainability.
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