Skepticism Over Egypt’s Plan to Develop Sinai: Al-Monitor
- Emphasis mine:
- Skepticism Over Egypt’s Plan to Develop Sinai: Al-Monitor
by https://www.middleeastobserver.org/
Amid threats posed by the Islamic State in Sinai, Egypt’s minister of planning announced $316 million worth of investments in the Sinai Peninsula for fiscal year 2020, plans seen by observers as skeptical.
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The Al-Monitor American website has published a report, titled “Skepticism looms over Egypt’s plan to develop Sinai”, questioning the Egyptian government’s development plans in Sinai in light of the ongoing attacks of the IS-local affiliate, “Sinai Province”, as follows:
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Egypt’s government is allocating investments in the Sinai Peninsula worth 5.23 billion Egyptian pounds ($316 million) for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2020. The Ministry of Planning, Monitoring and Administrative Reform announced the news in a statement Aug. 22.
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This would increase by about 75% the government investments registered in fiscal 2019 in Sinai and falls within the scope of the Egyptian government endeavors to develop the area reeling under decades of neglect.
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According to political analysts and economists, the Egyptian government is showing its commitments in the implementation of the Sinai development plan it embarked on in 2018. However, this plan faces major challenges amid threats from the Islamic State (IS) branch in Sinai, which the army is seeking to uproot from its stronghold in the northern part of the peninsula.
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“The government’s total investments in northern Sinai alone are about 2.85 billion pounds [$172 million], in addition to about 2.38 billion pounds [$144 million] in southern Sinai,” the ministry said in its statement.
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The ministry explained that “the investments allocated to northern Sinai will focus on education, water, agriculture, irrigation, transport and storage projects as well as real estate and construction activities. This is in addition to projects in south Sinai in the agriculture, irrigation, transport, education and other services sectors.”
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A Sinai source close to the security and government departments in Sinai said that for the first time the government has been expanding development projects in the peninsula. “But Sinai citizens have yet to feel the tangible results of these projects because of the security conditions there, especially in northern Sinai,” the source told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity.
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At a May 14 government meeting, Maj. Gen. Assem Abdullah, representative of the Armed Forces Engineering Authority (affiliated with the army and executing the Sinai development plan), noted that the Sinai Development Authority has completed the establishment of 171 out of 312 comprehensive development projects in the peninsula since June 30, 2014, at a cost of 199 billion pounds ($12 million). These projects include digging tunnels under the Suez Canal, developing El-Arish International Airport and establishing an industrial zone in Bir al-Abed and in the new city of Rafah.
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Meanwhile, Hassan Nafaa, a professor of political science at Cairo University, linked the development of northern Sinai to the US peace plan in the Middle East, known as the “deal of the century.” He told Al-Monitor that the leaks to the media about the US plan indicate that Sinai would be part of the political settlement plan for the Palestinian cause.
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The United States has denied these leaks. Trump’s Middle East peace envoy Jason Greenblatt refuted in an April 19 tweet any allegation that Sinai was part of the US peace plan.
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Nafaa added, “Nobody knows what’s going on in Sinai, which is almost a no-go zone in the north where military operations are taking place. The current Egyptian administration is not transparent and we cannot know exactly what’s going on in Sinai.”
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He expected to get a clear picture of the Sinai development plan by the end of this year, in light of the projected US peace process after the Israeli elections. “There will be no real development without knowing Sinai’s exact position in this [US] political process,” he concluded.
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