On the economic impact of the Revolution: links

Sharing a couple of articles I stumbled upon today on the topic of the economic impact of the revolution, short and long term.

Report: Egypt protests cost $310M per day - Associated Press

Credit Agricole, in one of the first assessments quantifying the damage to the economy, said the crisis is costing Egypt at least $310 million per day. The bank also revised down its forecast for 2011 GDP growth to 3.7 percent from 5.3 percent and said the Egyptian pound could see a depreciation of up to 20 percent.


CIB creates youth-driven fund, CI Capital's Karim Helal talks economy - Daily News Egypt

“Investors will take a pause now so the flow of FDI is bound to suffer. I don’t think it’s going to disappear at all but capital by definition is a coward, so they will take a pause to assess the situation,” according to Helal.

Egypt senses economic opportunity - UPI.com

"Economists in Egypt said short-term hits to the economy could turn to long-term gains if two weeks of protests end up mobilizing the population"

Blocking Internet cost Egyptian economy at least $90M - Muslimvillage.com

The Egyptian government’s five-day block of Internet services cost the national economy at least $90 million, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said Thursday. The Paris-based organization said telecommunications and Internet services account for between 3% and 4% of Egypt’s GDP, so the daily loss amounted to around $18 million.

Toll of protests on Egypt's tourism - CNN.com

If you want to see a CNN reporter make a fool of himself attempting to ride a camel.

Documenting Human Rights Violations in the 2011 Egyptian revolution

From January 25th onwards, the peaceful Egyptian revolution has been met with a violent reaction by the Government - whether from its uniformed police and army, its thugs in plainclothes, or its snipers from a distance..

An effort is underway to document those violations, in light of bringing all those guilty of human rights violations to justice.

HOW YOU CAN HELP:

If you have ANY document you think could be of use - be it an article, a report, a testimony, a picture (I think most people will be sending pictures and that's quite alright) send it to

HumanRightsEG at gmail dot com

Please include, when possible, any information about what you're sending. If it's a testimony, send the details; if it's a picture, include the date and place it was taken.

And spread the word!

Tear gas, 14:30, Friday 28 January

Egypt: Revolution Pessoptimism

People camped in front of army tanks - the Egyptian, chilled version of human shields

I thought we had lost momentum, until I - and I hope millions of others - watched an exhausted, beaten, Wael Ghonim's heart-wrenching interview a couple of hours ago.

Wael was the administrator of the "We are all Khaled Said" facebook group which has been widely credited for spreading, if not originating, the call for the January 25th protest-turned-revolution.

He cried, on live television, when he was shown the photos of the people who lost their lives during the revolution. He apologized to their parents, and said. "I swear it's not our fault.. it's the fault of the people desperately clinging to power..."


It's been an exhausting two weeks. Demonstrating is a lot of effort, especially if, like the vast majority of the people there, you have a life to care about, too.

Public opinion is very difficult to read. The population has, by and large, been extremely supportive of the demonstrators camped in Tahrir and other places, up until February 1st. On that evening the President gave a pathetic address about how he had served the country for godknowshowmany years, and wanted to end his presidential term. He played on people's emotional strings and it seemed to work.

More than anything though, he has also been playing quite a dirty media game - using all government and government-controlled channels and newspapers to paint the demonstrators in the worst possible light, tarnishing their great effort and essentially claiming that they are the root of all evil.
Economic slowdown? It's the demonstrators.
Police disappeared and thugs have taken control of the streets? Gotta be the demonstrators.
Countrywide curfew? Sure, their fault too.
Food and fuel shortages? Makes total sense that the demonstrators are guilty there too.

And people are buying it. People living in the vicinity of Tahrir square have been 'arresting' and robbing protestors or anyone they suspected of being one. Many of those, by the way, have gone to Tahrir square last Wednesday 2 Feb., to joined the government's hired thugs in beating up the peaceful (and pacifist) pro-change protestors.

More frighteningly, the army, which has been deployed in the streets of Cairo to maintain peace and security since the police decided to abandon the citizens to the mercy of street thugs, is also blaming the protestors for it.

When they were first deployed, people welcomed the army with open arms. They jumped on tanks and hugged soldiers. "The People and the Army, One hand united", they chanted.

They meant it at first.

In the past few days, the slogan has sounded increasingly forcible, insincere - almost an attempt to remind the army of their vow to protect them, or perhaps sway them to their cause.

But there have been a number of incidents where People-Army tensions have flared.
An unexpected visit by a couple of generals, one of them the chief of the armed forces in Cairo, who tried to persuade people to evacuate the square, first by going into a long monologue about regional balances, then by shouting at them, and ultimately by accusing the patients at the field hospital of faking illness and injuries to "make the country look bad" (vis-a-vis the rest of the world).

The ongoing gradual return to normal life will have an unpredictable effect on the revolution's momentum.

On one hand, it is likely to quiet popular criticism towards the demonstrators, as people's anger will dampen when they start going back to work, get paid, etc.

On the other, the price that demonstrators pay to remain in the square will largely increase in relative terms - they'll be foregoing their wage, which their colleagues will not be doing.

The political machinations in the making - opposition forces discussing between themselves, with the government, various 'councils of wisemen' and other groups who claim to represent the people in Tahrir square popping up like wild mushrooms - all will have an impact on a demonstration which, it seems to me, is living day-by-day.

Which brings me to Wael Ghonim's interview. The interview effectively swept, in one TV-minute, all the clutter that had been amassing atop the core issues: human, social and economic rights. Emergency law. The brutality of a police that opens fire on demonstrators. The blood shed and the lives lost.

I'll be going to Tahrir square tomorrow with a renewed faith. This revolution is just and fair.

And we're far, far from being done.
Tomorrow will be great. And so will the day after. And the day after.


['The pessoptimist' was the title of a novel by Emile Habibi - if you haven't guessed, it's the contraction of 'pessimist' and 'optimist'.]

Supplies needed by field hospital in Tahrir NOW متطلبات المستشفى الميداني في التحرير

(English follows. Spread away)

برجاء النشر!!

انا واقف مع دكاترة المستشفي الميداني اليوم ٣ فبراير الساعة ١١ صباحا و قالوا لي انهم محتاجين الآتي. يا ريت بسرعة قبل ما البلطجية يهجموا تاني

شاش (مهم جدا جدا)

شاش فازلين (اسمه كده ده بتاع الحروق)

بيتادين

مراهم حروق

خيط جراحة و ابر جراحة بتاعت الغرز

محلول ملحي

رباط ضاغط (كمان مهم جدا)

جوانتيات جراحية

زايلوكين محلي (بنج موضعي)

مضادات حيوية

مسكنات

I am currently at the field hospital in Tahrir square (a new makeshift clinic by the Franciscaine school across from the museum) and these are the supplies they are in dire need of. QUICK. it is now 11 am. They want the stuff. ASAP before the thugs attack again.

Medical gauze

Vaseline gauze (for burns)

Burn ointment

Surgical suture needle and thread

Saline solution

Bandages

Surgical gloves

Local zilocane (local anesthetic)

Antibiotics

Analgesics (pain killers)

Get that. Fast.

Live from tahrir square. 2 February - Eyewitness account

PLENTY (close to 200 I think) of photos are available HERE.

Until 4 pm, Tahrir square.

"We are a peaceful demonstration..." the man with the megaphone is louder than all, but it's easy to overlook his calls for calm above the madness happening in Tahrir square.

Pro-change demonstrators were attacked by an organized pro-Mubarak demo coming from the Corniche. They gathered by the TV building, they told me. One guy was unable to tell me what his own sign said. Many are wearing a laminated Egyptian flag around their neck. This is not only organized by the NDP (the president's party), it's terribly badly organized, too.

"Selmeyya, selmeyya..." ("Peaceful, peaceful...")
The pro-Mubarak ppl approached the square and pushed through the cordon of pro-change demonstrators, who chose to let them through to avoid clash. Their - our - commitment to non-violence is remarkable. Infuriating at times, but laudable.

The standoff began by the Egyptian museum. Two orderly lines facing. Attempts of provocation by the pro-Mubaraks - insults, "traitors! agents!".

They pushed. We pushed. It was non-violent until this point. At a secondary standoff, a pro-Mubarak person screams "I spit on you and on your mothers". A pro-change demonstrator was going to respond, but another guy grabs him -- "don't. Chant slogans instead".

Then came a second pro-Mubarak demo storming from Talaat Harb - throwing stones. And not the little kind, mind you, fist-sized stones. The first people are evacuated.

Selmeya, selmeya.."
Stones. Standoffs. We retreat. Regroup. Push forward again. Some people are panicking - rightfully. We are a mass of peaceful protestors and we're being attacked by a group of organized thugs. And it's really violent.

(Later)
I see kitchen knives. And swords. People are being attacked blindly. The back and forth, attack-withdraw-recollect-re

And - horses? Fucking horses? What is that? And the thugs riding them carry whips. Thank you, Mubarak.

5:00 - 6:00 pm.
Mayhem. Full-fledged stone throwing battle on Qasr-El-Nil bridge. The stones are ricocheting on the army tanks - I don't know where the soldiers are. Probably taking cover. Perhaps inside their tanks.
The battles are going insane. It's extremely messy in the square.
One of of the tanks was set on fire, but it was extinguished fairly rapidly. The other tank moved forward a little but then stopped.

7:00 pm
I am seeing a bunch of pro-Mubarak thugs throw Molotov cocktails at demonstrators. They broke into a shop, stood inside as they set their weapons, then would step outside and throw them.

Later (I stopped keeping track of time)
Mubarak thugs are armed to the teeth. Machetes, butcher knives. Molotov cocktails.

Fighting at its worse around the Egyptian Museum. I called a doctor who was there treating patients, and he had one word to describe the scene:

A carnage.

Midnight
Things have quieted down. Ambulances are allowed to go into Tahrir and reach patients - there are at least 1500 injured according to Reuters, and an unknown number of dead.

People are still out on the square though. I have left. The government is waging war on us, and the heroes in the square at this moment have won the battle.

I must sleep a little. God knows what tomorrow will bring. From my window I hear the noise of Tahrir square - I just heard Abdel Halim Hafez's "Khalli el sela7 sa7y". It's going to be a rough couple of days.