President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has come out to defend the tough economic measures undertaken by his government as a plan to help save Egypt from a deteriorating economy.
The stringent measures that included, subsidy cuts, tax reforms and privatization of state-owned company, were to help the government qualify for a 12 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund, in which the agency approved almost a week later.
The presidents’ remarks were the first since the governments’ unprecedented flotation of the Egyptian pound last month.
Despite political backlash being eminent for el-Sisi, the painful measures earned him praise from the IMF and the international business community. “The decision to carry out reforms is not easy,” stated el-Sisi.
El-Sisi however blamed the deteriorating economy on the past several years of unrest following the ouster of autocratic president Hosni Mubarak in a 2011 popular uprising.
Moreover, el-Sisi who portrays himself as a staunch anti-Islamist advocate, has urged for religious discourse to uproot extremism.
