'A safe place to live'

If news reports are anything to go by, Egypt appears to be in the middle of a crime wave. Jailan Halawi delves beneath the headlines

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Security officials, political experts, researchers and members of the public seem to agree that the nation's streets are less safe than they once were, a result, say many, of growing aggression fed by wide-spread frustration. And while Egypt remains a safe place in which to live, members of the public are more concerned than ever that they could become victims of crime.

Asked what most worried them, interviewees spoken to by Al-Ahram Weekly replied almost unanimously that their greatest concern was the increasingly aggressive attitude of the people with whom they came into contact. And the consensus seems to be that such aggression is a result of the state's failure to command the respect and trust of the public.

Among the most violent crimes to have recently hit the headlines was the discovery of 10 bodies in Minya, all with their genitals mutilated. The ensuing investigation led to the arrest and trial of a mentally disturbed man, though he was judged innocent by the court. Then there was the 25-year-old mother who threw her four-year-old son from the fourth floor of Mogammaa Al-Tahrir when officials refused to house him in an orphanage. Amira confessed to her crime, insisting she had wanted to get rid of her child "out of love" since she could not support him after she was deserted by her husband.

Equally chilling was the fate of the female university professor, murdered because she asked the driver of an army general to move his car so she could leave her building and get to work. She spoke to him rudely, calling him an idiot: it was the straw that broke the camel's back. Later he went up to the woman's apartment and murdered her.

During Eid Al-Fitr a group of young men was reported to have sexually harassed women who were unfortunate enough to cross their path on one of Downtown's busiest streets. While the Ministry of the Interior denies having received any complaints about such incidents they were widely reported in the press.

So what is going on? Have Egyptians, known for their peaceable natures, turned overnight into violent criminals?

"Egyptians are politically and economically frustrated, and this obviously impacts on their day to day interactions. Certainly, it is no longer true to say that aggressive behaviour is limited to criminals and police officers. I commute to work every day and on the way see traffic officers shouting at microbus drivers, drivers placing their hands on their horns and not removing them, screaming at one another and at pedestrians who respond by cursing the drivers. People seem ready to leap at each others' throats over seemingly petty matters. The culture of tolerance that has long existed among Egyptians is on the decline and that is a dangerous thing," says university professor Sherif Abdel-Aziz.

Retired army general Abdel-Salam Mohamed believes that problem stems from the lack of both role models the public can look up to and causes around which they can rally. In the late 1990s, he says, sensing the threat posed by the spread of terror, Egyptians united against it. But now "it is common to see people fighting; they seem to explode with anger in the middle of perfectly normal conversations."

"Unfortunately all this pent up aggression is feeding a wave of increasingly violent crime, where cases of simple theft can now lead to murder," says Major General Fouad Allam, a former head of the state security apparatus. "A state of chaos prevails, and discipline is lost."

The state, says Allam, increasingly expects the security apparatus to deal with social and economic troubles. "It should not be the job of security to have to deal with the opposition parties or the consequences of unemployment," he says, arguing that the state institutions and ministries that should be dealing with such issues are not pulling their weight.

Professor of Political Science Mustafa Kamel El-Sayed, director of the Research and Study Centre for Economics at Cairo University agrees, warning that there is a point beyond which "security forces will not be able to contain such crises that come with deteriorating socio-economic conditions".

Yet others note that the police are now so involved in protecting the regime that their responsibility to ordinary citizens has been forgotten.

"As a police officer I don't believe we are doing enough to maintain order in the streets but people should understand the conditions we face are the same as everybody else. We work under impossible conditions, our jobs are often dangerous yet the salaries are barely enough to keep us going. The public blames the police for being aggressive, but the public has itself become aggressive," said one young police officer.

Recent research suggests that those who commit crimes come from a wider range of backgrounds than previously.

"We now find that students, government officials and businessmen are responsible for a significant percentage of crimes committed," says El-Sayed.

While white collar crimes seldom involve violence, the number of officials and businessmen involved in embezzlement, bribery and the forging of documents is on the increase, says El-Sayed. And increasing use of new technology, particularly the Internet, has opened up a whole new field which e-criminals are ruthlessly exploiting.

The basic problem, he says, is that while Egypt has witnessed economic growth it has been to the benefit of a tiny minority. The Minister of Economic Development Osman Mohamed Osman said in a recent report that poverty levels in Egypt were on the increase.

"Egypt remains a safe place to live but, unless a different approach is adopted to ensure the benefits of growth are spread more equally, that could change," he believes.

Political analyst Fahmi Howeidy has argued in recent articles that the state urgently needs to upgrade public services across the board -- health, transportation, education, housing -- if it is not to alienate the public completely. It is an approach with which many agree.

"In a country where the rich grow ever richer and the poor more desperate you cannot expect order to prevail. In the absence of state provision squatter settlements have grown up all over the country. In Cairo those who live in these shanty towns watch others driving luxury cars, living in large villas, leading hugely extravagant lives while they can barely feed themselves. Can you expect such a situation to breed anything except resentment?" asks accountant Ahmed Farouk.

Are policy makers sufficiently aware of the extent of the problems? And are they taking the steps necessary to tackle the crisis?

No, say most of those interviewed by the Weekly.

The state, they are convinced, still believes that economic growth alone can solve Egypt's woes. Yet unless the benefits of that growth are distributed more equitably, it could in fact act to exacerbate the situation.

"You can no longer bank on the tolerance of the public to guarantee domestic security," says El-Sayed. "If the economic and social conditions of the majority of people continue to deteriorate, crime will inevitably rise and Egypt could eventually become a dangerous place to live."