Home / 2021 Collective Articles / We build, we don’t destroy.

We build, we don’t destroy.

We build, we don’t destroy.
Hossam Badrawi
I told my friend the Nazarene writer:
Why attack the private sector?
We want to encourage and support him, not blame him and create a negative attitude towards him that is already present in society.
Jobs are created by the private sector, and tax revenues come from it.
Whoever kept Egypt alive after the tragedy and chaos after 2011 was a private sector outside the state’s radar.
Reply to:
Your Honor, I must be aware of the corruption of the private sector in Egypt, and of the organized looting practiced by this sector, which, if its files were published, would become a shameful scandal.
30 years of organized looting in the shadow of a marriage of power and wealth, Doctor.
I Saied to him:
I prefer that those who err and who do wrong be prosecuted within the framework of the law instead of vaccinating speech, and considering that everyone who makes a profit must be a thief and an accused, knowing that this sector includes more than 4 million companies in Egypt.
Sir, not all should be accused of the faults of a minority, if any. Circular risk.
There is no hope for economic development without a private sector.
Nor can the creation of new jobs without direct Egyptian and foreign investments.
As for corruption, it has an international definition that is not related to the private sector, but rather to state employees and in the absence of law enforcement.
When the private sector makes a mistake, the shareholders will hold it accountable. When it breaks the law, this is a crime. Corruption is another matter.
The definition of corruption beyond what people think is dishonest actions by people in positions of authority, such as managers, government officials and others, for private gain, whether authoritarian or financial. It is an impression formed by repeating the action to obtain the right, such as bribery, mediation, rigging elections, or awarding major projects by defrauding the law. Corruption also has causes that can be avoided, not only by exposing it, but by taking good governance measures in the administration of the state, paying decent salaries to employees, and applying digital rules in delivering the services and rights of citizens to them without mediation or bribery, big or small.
Corruption means, my friend, incompetent management of the state and selective application of the law.
He commented:
This is a significant discussion and there must be a broader dialogue on this issue.
I said:
Egypt needs to create one million new jobs annually, and by calculation, this needs more than $30 billion in investments from outside the state budget (ie from the private sector). Who is investing, and who is going to come into a market in which the investor is accused before he starts working.
He replied:
These are legitimate questions, but I have noticed that the private sector attacks state projects and companies and claims that they kill competition, even though they provide the community with its needs at reasonable prices.
I said: Government investments, or what we used to say about the public sector, were aimed at providing goods at really simple prices, regardless of the cost. As in the Soviet Union, the system that we are still defending has gone bankrupt.
Cheap production regardless of cost and without respect for market mechanisms, competition rules and transparency ends up with inefficient product and economic loss. Usually the cost increases with the salaries of those who do not need this production in a factory or company because there is no account for the value of profit and loss.
Let us see examples around us, without embarrassment, major press institutions, government agencies, and factories that are overcrowded with employees and economically losing, and we adhere to their existence despite their heavy losses, and even distribute rewards to their workers.
Sir, we adhere to systems that have proven to fail at their inventors, and as the late satirist Mahmoud Al-Saadani told me one day, the factory closed its doors in Russia and the agent is working in Egypt.
My friend Al-Nasiri replied, saying: I may understand your point of view on the philosophy of the public sector, but this does not apply to the investments of the disciplined armed forces, which are made in the shortest time and it is not right to criticize them.
I said: Just saying that she will not be held accountable offends her and does not add to her. The state’s intervention at a historical moment in the economy with direct investment may have a time justification as a catalyst, but as long as competition is unbalanced and outside the scope of economic accounting for profit and loss, this trend is unfortunately unsustainable.
Another friend, a member of Parliament, said: What do you advise, Doctor, given your experience?
I said: In my mind, there are three main pillars of development, the first of which is easing the state’s control and its direct intervention in the affairs of individuals and institutions, the second of which is a structural change in the Egyptian economy with the aim of stimulating growth, its sustainability and its balance with the creation of employment opportunities, and the third of which is complete justice that gives everyone the right, the right to the right time.
The first approach is something we call and seek, but it requires a change in the culture of society, which, despite its harsh criticism of the government, its continuous complaints about the state bureaucracy, and its violation of its rights, still seeks the intervention of the same state in its life as if it contradicts itself, which means more freedom, within the framework of respect Legitimacy and the constitution.
It remains to reduce the state’s control over the economy, and not to interfere directly as a competitor in the markets, but rather as a regulator and guardian of justice and equal opportunities. Although the private sector actually absorbs 70% of employment, and is actually responsible for more than that of the national income, I still see the desire of some to return to direct state intervention in the ownership of production sectors.
Experience has proven the failure of governments, even if it appears otherwise in the short term, to manage investment in the name of the people.
The role of the state within the framework of the changes that occur politically and economically, must be clearly defined, because its complete withdrawal is not correct, nor is its monopoly on all development tools correct. The state’s regulating and reference role, the guarantor of justice and equal opportunities, and the application of the law… requires strong governments with a vision and commitments.
The easiest thing for governments in developing countries is to control and control, and the most difficult is to motivate society to participate without selectivity that we monitor, negatively affecting the movement of society as a whole.
As for the second pillar, human development cannot reach its goals without paralleling its programs with economic programs that increase wealth, eradicate poverty and open fields of work for graduates of educational institutions of all kinds.
Achieving sustainable growth
Wazen and the sustainable approach associated with increasing employment opportunities must be accompanied by giving priority to the disadvantaged groups of the population without affecting the balance of the state budget, in order to accelerate the achievement of an economic growth rate of 7% to 8% on average annually for fifteen consecutive years. It is a difficult matter, but it can be achieved by sustaining policies, convincing the people of them, and respecting their philosophy, without retreating or deviating from it for a short-term public political goal.
The balanced growth of the economy in this way and this ratio on the other hand cannot be achieved without the completion and expansion of the infrastructure and public utilities so that it can absorb this growth, which is what the state has actually done in recent years.
The six locomotives capable of creating job opportunities may be:
First: Information and communications technology and associated service exports.
Second, industrial exports are labor- and skill-intensive.
Third: unconventional agricultural manufacturing and horticultural crops.
Fourth: Tourism with all its logistical, hotel and cultural activities.
Fifth: The small and medium business sector in general.
Finally: housing and construction, which accommodates about a hundred professions, is linked to a wide employment and a great economic and social return. My main focus in this context is to increase wealth and eradicate poverty once and for all.
All of the state’s plans over the years have been talking about reducing the poverty rate, and I’m talking about eradicating poverty once and for all.
This is mainly embodied in raising the efficiency of education and solving the challenges of unemployment, as they are the most important roots of poverty.