European Bank for Development Encourages Egypt to Pursue its Pre-Revolution Privatization Schemes

The European Bank for Development and Reconstruction issues a strategy for Egypt that does not include human development as a goal

The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) today released an analysis of the European Bank for Development and Reconstruction (EBDR)'s technical assessment of Egypt's development and democratization processes, released February 2012. The EBDR’s assessment is a piece of work that clearly reveals the Bank’s lack of commitment to democracy and development in post-revolutionary Egypt. An in-depth reading of the assessment shows that the Bank hardly commits to either. The assessment also draws out the Bank's strategy for future and potential projects in specific areas.

 "Reports issued by international financial institutions are of extreme importance at this juncture as they seem to be the only actor that has some vision of how economic development is to ensue in the near future, in light of the absence of a lawfully-elected government or president and the lack of any clear socio-economic stance within the parliamentary majority " says Amr Adly, head of the EIPR's Economic and Social Justice Unit. "Moreover, Egypt's urgent need for an economic "shot in the arm" in the form of external loans is likely to strengthen the potential role of the IFIs in the setting of fiscal, monetary and economic policies in