I continue writing about Talaat Harb and
challenging colonization… the role of Bank Misr in industrialization in the
time span from 1920 to 1941 based on the highly important reference rich in its
information and in-depth analyses “Challenging colonization: Bank Misr
and Egyptian industrialization 1920 – 1941" written by Eric Davis, translated by Hisham Soliman Abdel-Ghaffar, revised and introduced by Mr. Dr. Ibrahim Fawzi; the one who attracted my attention to the
importance of rereading the reference especially in this time in our country’s
history wishing that those elite bunch possessing power in Egypt; whether the wealthy,
businessmen, officials in charge or others, may make use of the lessons learnt
from that era in our history.
Here, I would like to appeal to the
officials in charge of Bank Misr right now and ask them to publish
this book on a wide scale in Maktabet al-Osra’ publications series or
other one so that every Egyptian, who wants to learn and look up to great
pioneers like Talaat Harb and those who helped him, can read it… in doing such
thing, Bank Misr would be returning part of the favor of that man who took the
responsibility of establishing this bank.
The book author says that the support offered
from students’ groups and agricultural bourgeoisie to Bank Misr resulted in
that the merchants all over Egypt started forming commercial chambers in the
wake of 1919 revolution… despite no evidence was given that these institutions
were immersed in the promotion for buying Bank Misr’s shares, these commercial
chambers were fierce in their call for boycott… they issued several statements
calling for withdrawing deposits from the foreign banks and directing them to
Bank Misr… they also asked for replacing Al-Ahli or the National Bank with Bank
Misr since the former was controlled by the English as the very important state
bank…
Also, comparisons between Al-Ahli or the
National Bank enjoying the high status and Bank Misr that was just established
contributed to reinforcing the position of the latter to people in general…
they also helped undoubtedly in encouraging the Egyptians hesitating; those who
were known to prefer investing in real estate than bank deposits in saving
their money… such comparisons encouraged them to buy shares and have bank
accounts in Bank Misr… Abdel-Maged al-Ramalli; secretary of Cairo commercial chamber,
confirmed that if every Egyptian bought a single share of Bank Misr capital,
the whole yield would be enough to fund the industrial projects Bank Misr was
hoping to do.
If we added to the commercial chambers
what the “agricultural bourgeoisie” did, that bourgeoisie that became more
aware of its interests and so it established strong pressure group in 1920;
that was the public Egyptian agricultural syndicate, to practice pressure over
the government to follow policies where there interests are taken into
consideration… adding to this also the orientation to establish and strengthen
the cooperative movement… we would realize that the process of establishing a
national bank has turned into what we may call an epic of a conscious national
act where the participants in it became aware of their interests and of the
conflict with the foreign capitalism.
However, things did not go well all the
time as the conflict between “national” and “foreign” led the foreign capital
to adopt tricks and tactics supporting it in such conflict… and so, many foreign
companies tended to re-register themselves as Egyptian companies to make use of
the laws and policies applied by the patriotic governments at that era…
Those companies meant to attract a
number of the high class members… some other companies meant to depend on those
who were granted their Egyptian nationality recently especially those of the Greek,
Levant, Armenian and Jewish origins… then those foreign companies, which had
re-registered as Egyptian companies, sought the help of political
activists at that time… especially ex-ministers and deputy ministers; those
experts in the governmental affairs and complications of laws related to the
work of the Egyptian joint-stock companies.
Some of those sought for help were owners
of vast areas of lands despite they did not inherit any of those lands…
actually, their ownership of all those lands came from practicing politics and
assuming public job positions during which they usually received bribes as “supplements
for their income”.
Here, the author stops at a remarkable
phenomenon and which is almost recurring since the beginning of the last
century to date; that is the class resulting from the Egyptian bourgeoisie –
meaning those who did not decent from families enjoying wealth or power and
their grandfathers were not villages’ mayors… but actually most of their
fathers were humble farmers and government employees – this class or sector was
the most subordinate to the foreign capital.
In such regard, author Eric Davis wrote
a very serious paragraph saying: “members of the Egyptian bourgeoisie who
collaborated with the foreign capital during the thirties of the twentieth
century should be looked at by using terms of the new occupation… as they
represented a front hiding behind the principle controller in the companies
under scrutiny… on the surface, it looked as if the Egyptians became more
powerful in controlling their economy than it was the case in reality… also, a number
of the members of those class were the ones who turned the tables against the financially-distressed
companies of Bank Misr in 1939”!
My stating exclaiming question now: does
history repeat itself?... do we witness the same phenomenon again in Egypt with
the political activists since 2000 to date… those who turned the tables against
the national principles when they accepted to receive foreign funds and commit to
the agendas of those funding them overseas?
Translated into English by: Dalia
Elnaggar
This article was
published in Almasry alyoum newspaper on June 28, 2017.
To see the
original article, go to:
#almasry_alyoum
#ahmed_elgammal #Egypt #Talaat_Harb #economy #Bank_Misr
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