Month: November 2006
Garbage protest
اعتراضاً على الزيادة التى Ù�رضتها الدولة على المواطنين البسطاء، ألا وهى مبالغ الاتاوة على Ù�اتورة الكهرباء. ونØÙ† Ù†Øترم القانون الذى لايØترمة اللصوص سارقى اموال الشعب المكاÙ�Ø Ø§Ù„Ø¨Ø³ÙŠØ· من ابناء الشعب المصرى ولسنا اقل من Ù…ØاÙ�ظة الجيزة التى Øصلت اللجنة الشعبية Ù„Øماية المستهلك من الجباية والÙ�ساد ØŒ والتى استطاعت Ù�Ù‰ السابق وبمازرة جماهير الجيزة Ù�Ù‰ الØصول على الØكم النهائى بالغاء رسوم النظاÙ�Ø© المضاÙ�Ø© على Ù�اتورة الكهرباءونØÙ† نعلن عدم دÙ�ع الاتاوة الى سارقى اموال الشعب
العنوان: لوهتركب مترو المتجة الى المرج تنزل Ù�Ù‰ Ù…Øطة مترو Øلمية الزيتون وتخرج من Ù†Ù�س الاتجاة التى الشارع وبجانب كوبرى الØلمية وصولا الى ميدان المطرية
لو هتركب اى اتوبيس من اى ميدان العتبة او التØرير او الجيزةاو رمسيس الى ميدان المطرية مباشرة
الØركة المصرية من اجل التغيير ÙƒÙ�اية (لجنة ØÙ‰ المطرية ) الاستعلام ت 0104037475
University professors protest thuggery against students
In recent weeks, Ain Shams University campus has been the scene of bloody clashes between the Free Student Union activists and the security-appointed official Student Union members. The latter brought into campus thugs armed with knives, swords, daggers, molotov cocktails in a terror campign to disrupt the FSU elections and intimidate the activists.
Truth in advertising
Are Egyptians being swindled of their gas?
There are EGPC supply contracts to Union Fenosa and Jordan. The prices are not published. It is said that the price to Union Fenosa is low. The highest number mentioned by observers of the Egyptian gas scene is $0.90 MBtu. Lower numbers, such as $0.65 MBtu are sometimes quoted. This is the price at the point of entry to the LNG plant. If these numbers are gross underestimates EGPC/EGAS would be wise to publish the true figures in order to set the record straight. It is true that in compensation for the low selling price EGPC/EGAS has provided some advantages such as delayed paying of their equity share in the LNG plant and the right to use up to 50 percent of the facility for their own exports under a tolling agreement. But what is the value of these advantages compared to the assumed loss on every Btu sold?
The sale price to Jordan is said to be set at $1.50 MBtu which is a more reasonable number. Yet one needs to keep in mind that Egypt purchases gas at the margin from foreign investors at $2.50/2.65 MBtu. To say that it gets 60-70 percent profit oil at zero price and that the average cost of acquisition is therefore much lower than $2.65 is the wrong argument. As discussed previously, in the case of oil the equity oil is a rent for the state not necessarily a fund to subsidize domestic consumption or exports. It is interesting to note a peculiarity in the agreement with BG for the development of gas fields dedicated to exports. There is a clause stating that if the netback revenue falls below the price at which the gas would be sold to EGPC for domestic use, EGPC would compensate the investor for the difference. Given that the investor was keen on the export option, the notion that he should be compensated whenever the domestic market becomes more attractive simply means that, as the English saying puts it, ‘he wants to have his cake and eat it too.’
. . .We also have to allow for the factors that may have influenced the negotiations of the initial contracts—a multiplicity of objectives which were to be achieved all at the same time. Hence, perhaps, certain concessions on prices were made which may not have been the case given other circumstances.
Circumstances have changed. The information available suggests that all the contracts relating to the export of gas should be now re-opened and re-negotiated. This is possible whatever the precise re-opening clauses state. The fact that Egypt sells at a much lower price than that at which it purchases gas is sufficiently explosive to justify re-negotiation. The foreign companies involved in the contracts would be unwise to oppose a re-opening. Contracts are a formal framework for a relationship. It is the relationship that matters, and it will only work to the benefit of both parties if it is continually perceived as fair by both of them.
G-A-U-N-T-A-N-A-M-O-U-S-E!
And on the same (well, kind of the same) note, Banksy does Disney does Gitmo. Check out the video of how he got the job done.
Lebanese political graffiti
Baheyya on Ismail Sabri Abdallah
I wish Baheyya would write more these days, but then again things are so much more depressing than they were last year. I can’t blame her for hibernating.
Update: Al Ahram Weekly also has pieces on Abdullah here and here.
Mountains and plains (21)
November 24, 2006
It was just such a classic Baghdad return. The sky was hazy and overcast as we drove back from the airport. The traffic was bad, a convoy of SUVs featuring guys with assault rifles hanging out of the window came blaring past. And then back at the office a bombing that killed 25 people in a Shiite neighborhood soon mushroomed into stunning death toll of over 200.
Soon I was scribbling away, updating stories, answering calls from radio stations describing the latest “brutal” attack in Baghdad and the ongoing “civil war” or was it just a “sectarian conflict” as bombs “rip apart” the neighborhood in a city “convulsed” by violence as the “fabric of society frays” or whatever other cliché I’ve gotten so used to using to describe the nasty situation here.
And there, barely, at the edge of it all, are the memories of the mountains I had been in just that morning. I want to go back to the northern Iraq, the border with Iran. To the clean, crisp air, the rugged terrain, snow-capped mountains, and idealistic young guerillas in the baggy Kurdish trousers and vests of their revolutionary uniform.