The most notable of last night’s segments was probably Hona Al Asema’s Lamees El Hadidi’s phone conversation with Transport Minister Hisham Arafat, who said that he would be over at the House of Representatives today to discuss solutions for the woes of the Cairo Metro Company. The company’s recent financial troubles, Arafat said, is the result of multiple issues, such as maintaining ticket prices at EGP 1 and increasing wages by some 400% between 2011 and 2017. He also said that while studies have concluded that the average ticket price should currently stand at EGP 4, “that’s not something we can do given citizens’ challenging economic circumstances right now.”
The minister also spoke to Lamees briefly about five major shipping lines halting their operations at the port of East Port Said, which include Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Hapag-Loyd, Yang Ming Marine Transport, and Nippon Yusen Kabushiki (watch, runtime 11:11).
El Hadidy then shifted to coverage of the recent decision to ban electronic devices from airplane cabins of UK and US flights jetting out of a few Muslim countries. The decision, according to the head of Asharq Alawsat newspaper’s DC office Heba El-Qodsy, is meant to minimize the potential existence of remote-control detonators (watch, runtime 5:54).
Meanwhile on Masaa DMC, host Osama Kamal gave the floor to readymade garment exporters’ criticisms of the government for decreasing its support and halting export subsidies for the past year. Government statistics apparently showed that each EGP 1 of subsidies brings back some USD 6 to the state (watch, runtime 6:56).
On Mehwar’s 90 Minutes, MP Ismail Nasr El Din talked to the host about proposed amendments to the controversial old leasing law, which has kept rent prices for old properties at a stable rate for decades and has now come to the forefront of the debate (watch, runtime 45:02). The MP reassured citizens that the amendments to the legislation will not evict people from homes they have lived in for years.
Amr Adib will reportedly made quite the comeback tonight with an interview with Lebanese Prime Minister Saad El Hariri that we will definitely be watching out for.