Sunday, November 24, 2013

New Court Judgment Against Ahmed Ezz

أيدت محكمة الجنايات المصرية يوم السبت قرار جهاز الكسب غير المشروع بمنع رجل الأعمال أحمد عز وأسرته من التصرف في أموالهم أو السفر. (المصدر: أهرام أون لاين)

تعليقنا:

*         في رأينا، لن يكون لهذا الحكم أي تأثير مباشر على العمليات في شركتي حديد عز أو عز الدخيلة.

*         ولكن لدينا مخاوف حول تأثير هذه الأخبار على نظرة المستثمرين للسهم على المدى القريب؛ حيث يمتلك أحمد عز حوالي 66٪ من شركة حديد عز.

*         ومن الجدير بالذكر، إن محكمة جنايات الجيزة قضت في يونيو الماضي بسجن أحمد عز لمدة 37 عامًا ودفع غرامة مالية قدرها 2 مليار جنيه، وذلك في القضايا المتعلقة بغسل الأموال وإهدار المال العام.


Thursday, November 21, 2013

Government to re-offer Omar Effendi for sale - Egyptian Stock Exchange | Mubasher


Government to re-offer Omar Effendi for sale

The board of state-owned department store Omar Effendi decided to re-offer the company for privatization within days, after obtaining the approval of the government, according to Al Masry Al Youm gazette.

Chairman Ezzat Mahmoud said that twenty branches would be sold in two phases via public auctions.

He stressed the government's commitment to obligate the potential buyer to retain work force and the brand.

In early August, 2013, the supreme administrative court had annulled the sale of Omar Effendi to Saudi Arabia's Anwal United Trading Company, according to Ahram Online.
The court rejected appeals submitted by Anwal head Gamil Al-Kanbit, along with National Bank of Egypt and Audi Bank, against a 2011 ruling by the State Council's Administrative Court which annulled the Saudi businessman's purchase of 90 percent of the iconic Egyptian chain and restored it to public ownership.
The sale of the struggling public sector company for the controversial price of EGP 589.5 million, was invalidated on grounds that it had violated Egyptian law as it was done through direct order rather than a public auction, a judicial source told Ahram Online.

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Reuters: Google prevails over authors in book-scanning U.S. lawsuit

From Reuters News:

Google prevails over authors in book-scanning U.S. lawsuit

NEW YORK - Google Inc won dismissal of a long-running lawsuit by authors who accused the Internet search company of digitally copying millions of books for an online library without permission.

This service is not intended to encourage spam. The details provided have been used for the sole purpose of facilitating this email communication and have not been retained by Thomson Reuters.



Mohamed E. Shaheen from iphone

Egypt Corporate Lawyers: BBC News - Egypt lifting state of emergency and cu...

Egypt Corporate Lawyers: BBC News - Egypt lifting state of emergency and cu...: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-24914121 Egypt lifting state of emergency 12 November ...

BBC News - Egypt lifting state of emergency and curfew


Egypt lifting state of emergency

12 November 2013 Last updated at 17:51 GMT
Egyptian armed forces search vehicles at a checkpoint during curfew in Nasr City, Cairo, Egypt (19 August 2013) The state of emergency allowed the authorities to make arrests without warrants

Egypt's government says it is lifting the country's three-month state of emergency and night-time curfew.

The move comes two days earlier than expected, after a court ruling.

An aide to the prime minister said the measures had ended at 14:00 GMT, but the government later said it was still waiting for the text of the ruling.

The measures were introduced on 14 August after security forces forcibly ended sit-ins in support of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi.

They had been due to last a month, but the government extended them for two more months on 12 September.

New protest law

An adviser to Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi told the BBC that both the state of emergency and the 01:00-05:00 curfew were lifted with effect from 16:00 local time (14:00 GMT) on Tuesday.

This followed the ruling by the administrative court that said the decree extending the measures should only be effective for two calendar months.

However, a cabinet statement then said Cairo was still waiting for the text of the ruling before implementing it.

The statement also stressed that the army-backed government would abide by the verdict.

The state of emergency and the curfew allowed the authorities to make arrests without warrants and search people's homes.

Many people have also blamed the curfew for a fall in business in Cairo - at a time when the government is trying to create jobs and revive the economy.

The measures were introduced after hundreds of people died following the clearing of the pro-Morsi camps in the capital.

Mr Morsi, the country's first democratically elected president, was ousted by the army in July following widespread demonstrations against his rule.

He is currently on trial for allegedly inciting the killing of protesters outside the presidential palace in 2012.

Egyptians lived under a state of emergency - which gives extra powers to the security services - for more than three decades, until President Hosni Mubarak was forced from power amid mass protests in 2011.

Even with Thursday's moves, Egypt's military-backed government will still be keeping a tight grip, the BBC's Orla Guerin in Cairo reports.

The authorities say security forces will be deployed on main streets and in city centres across the country to tighten control, our correspondent says.

And she adds that stringent new limits on freedom of movement are expected to be introduced soon, in a law regulating public protest.

Human rights campaigners say the proposals will give police the power to ban protests outright.

A draft legislation - currently being considered by Interim President Adly Mahmud Mansour - requires protest organisers to notify police in advance of any meeting of more than 10 people, in public or in private.


Thursday, November 7, 2013

Egypt Corporate Lawyers: BBC News - Morsi trial is latest chapter in Egypt'...

Egypt Corporate Lawyers: BBC News - Morsi trial is latest chapter in Egypt'...: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-24804211 Morsi trial is latest chapter in Egypt's power stru...

BBC News - Morsi trial is latest chapter in Egypt's power struggle


Morsi trial is latest chapter in Egypt's power struggle

4 November 2013 Last updated at 14:20 GMT Kevin Connolly By Kevin Connolly BBC News, Cairo
Supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and of ousted president Mohamed Morsi face riot police as rally outside the Police Academy where his trial is taking place on November 4, 2013, in Cairo Demonstrators faced riot officers outside the hearing at the Police Academy

In Egypt, the trial of Mohammed Morsi is also a trial of strength pitting the military-backed authorities against the Islamist president they ousted in the summer.

The main charge - of responsibility for the deaths of protesters during his time in office - is something of a secondary issue. This is about who rules Egypt, now and in the future.

The Muslim Brotherhood, cowed but not defeated by the violent crackdown on dissent over the last few months, will be desperate to show that it still has the capacity to bring its people onto the streets.

The new government will be equally keen to show that it has the political will - and the grip on power - to go ahead with a trial, which will be intensely controversial.

It took all the obvious steps to ensure that Morsi supporters would find it difficult to use the trial as a trigger for renewed demonstrations.

Seize the moment

The proceedings were not televised, to deprive the ousted president of any opportunity to grandstand for a live nationwide audience.

And to keep the crowds away, they were conducted more than an hour's drive from the centre of the Egyptian capital at the high-walled campus of the national Police Academy out beyond the dusty ring-road.

Mr Morsi did what he could to seize the moment.

His supporters updated their Facebook pages as the proceedings unfolded to claim that he had caused a delay by refusing to wear prison clothing.

Supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi shout slogans in his support outside the Police Academy where his trial is taking place on November 4 Protesters outside the hearing were passionate but largely peaceful

And they claimed there was a temporary adjournment when he told the judge: "I am your president. You have no legitimacy."

At that point we were told the other Islamists charged alongside him began chanting "Down with the military".

Displaying defiance

If that is an accurate reflection of how the proceedings went, it shows that Mr Morsi understands the importance of using this hearing as a platform to rally the beleaguered supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, which has been out-manoeuvred by the Egyptian army in recent months.

A small number of demonstrators did make their way out to the Police Academy for the hearing - one of them angrily told a group of policemen on security duty outside the compound that they too would one day find themselves on trial.

The demonstrators were few in number but they were passionate and angry.

When they overheard a reporter from a pro-government television station broadcasting live from their midst, they chased him and his team away.

A hail of rocks followed the satellite truck as it fled with the cameraman still filming from a precarious platform on the top.

The crowd, though, was largely peaceful.

Among them we found Ahmad, a 37-year-old pharmacist, who told us it was wrong to see Egypt's current crisis as a straightforward clash between the military authorities and political Islam.

He voted for Mohammed Morsi but told us: "This is not about the return of Morsi. This is about the return of freedom in Egypt.

"We want to know when we can have our voices and our freedom back. I don't know why they won't tell me that."

Chaotic days

The truth is, though, that a power struggle between the army and the Islamists is under way in Egypt, and the Morsi trial is merely the latest chapter in it.

Very few Egyptians ever expect to see him back in office, whatever the outcome of the court proceedings.

His supporters will feel that by displaying defiance and by insisting that he remains Egypt's rightful president he will have preserved some dignity at a humiliating moment and reminded the wider world that the Brotherhood in Egypt has not gone away.

Supporters of Egypt's ousted President Mohammed Morsi hold a a protest against Morsi's trial in front of the supreme constitutional court in Cairo, on Monday 4 November 2013 Supporters of Mohammed Morsi still staged rallies in the capital

There were protests in central Cairo but the military authorities will be quietly pleased if the day passes without major confrontations and widespread violence.

All in all though, these are chaotic days in Egypt.

It says a good deal about the breakneck pace of change here that the trial of one ousted president - Mr Morsi - is beginning before the trial of his predecessor Hosni Mubarak on similar charges has been completed.

Egyptians tell a joke which sums it up.

When you get elected here, they tell you, you serve two terms.

One in the presidential palace, then one in prison.

Mr Mubarak has already been released from prison - although he still faces a retrial. Mr Morsi, who replaced Mr Mubarak in the presidential palace, will now be hoping he doesn't replace him in jail after his trial is finally over.