Hey Hosni! Show Us the Money
by C. L. Cook
Ding Dong, the Dictator is dead! The house that fell on the head of autocrat Hosni Mubarak today was, in the end, one of his own making. Now, he is on the move, but he can't move faster than international financiers can put the grab on "his" money.
Last week, everyone but Hosni's bankers were shocked to hear just how much of the Egyptian treasury Mubarak had socked away for the benefit of himself and his family. The estimates of his purloined lucre are anywhere between 40 and 70 billion US dollars, mostly believed to have been siphoned off massive military contracts.
Sure, he had almost thirty years with the keys to the national piggy bank, but in a country where the majority exists on a paltry two dollars a day, Mubarak's larceny marks him as the mastermind behind the world's greatest heist; likely making him the greatest crook in history.
At this hour, with the Thief of Cairo barely a step ahead of the mob, the question is: "Where's the dough, Hosni?"
Haig Simonian of the Financial Times reports Switzerland today froze the accounts of Hosni Mubarak, his wife, his two sons and their wives, (and a brother in-law) held in that country.
For good measure, (and in accordance with their newly toughened banking laws), the Swiss barred access to accounts held by erstwhile Mubarak government officials, including: Ahmed Alaa El Din Amin El-Maghrabi, minister for housing and urban development; Mohamed Zoheir Mohamed Wahid
Garana, former tourism minister, Habib Ibrahim El Adli, former interior
minister, Rachid Mohamed Rachid, former trade and industry minister, and
Ahmed Ezz, a prominent businessman and former secretary of the ruling
National Democratic party.
Speaking for the government, André Simonazzi said the amount of money held in the accounts of those named is not known. Equally mysterious is just how much Mubarak and his fellow Kleptocrats managed to salt away in foreign holdings, and in nations with more opaque banking policies than Switzerland's. The Swiss special decree against Mubarak, et al includes too the freezing of all assets, including property and luxury goods.
Were it just the money. At least three hundred Egyptians lost their lives in the last three weeks; how many more died at the hands of police torturers and thugs over the span of Mubarak's rule will probably never be tallied. The next question will be one of accountability for the myriad crimes against the people committed by the regime over its too long internationally condoned rule.
Mubarak called it quits less than 24 hours after delivering a bizarre address to the nation, the third over the last two weeks of an 18 days long campaign of civil disobedience, refusing to relinquish the reins of power.
Canadian state broadcaster, the CBC reported Mubarak's last public address at approximately 6pm local time, quoting recently named vice-president, Omar Suleiman saying;
"In these
difficult circumstances that the country is passing through, President
Hosni Mubarak has decided to leave the position of the presidency. He
has commissioned the armed forces council to direct the issues of the
state."
What happens next is the big question, both for Egypt and the entire restive region.
"The removal
of Mubarak alone (and getting the bulk of his $40bn loot back for the
national treasury), without any other reforms, would itself be
experienced in the region and in Egypt as a huge political triumph. It
will set new forces into motion. A nation that has witnessed miracles of
mass mobilisations and a huge rise in popular political consciousness
will not be easy to crush, as Tunisia demonstrates."
In the streets of Cairo, and around the country, millions of Egyptians are in the streets, celebrating the end of a dark period in that country's history, and hoping for a better future. Whether Mubarak's patron, the United States and its "international community, will allow more than rhetoric on that point is still to be seen.
For now, it's good wishes from all quarters for Egypt on its Happy Birthday.
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