![]() ![]() “One thing I am seeing now is less and less commitment to the revolution and its values,” Attalah said. Since the Muslim Brotherhood rose to power in elections last year, promises to adhere to many revolutionary demands, particularly those linked to free press, were shelved as President Morsi quickly became the target of public scrutiny for a number of controversial executive orders, including drafting a new constitution late last year despite a boycott from the opposition or religious minorities. The Arab world’s most populous nation, Egypt is also home to its most widely read newspaper, state-run Al-Ahram, and so Egypt’s standards for journalism impact and influence many other countries in the region.Īnd Attalah says that, though the revolution was just over two years ago, an initial media openness is now changing. Most importantly, the paper provided a medium for bilingual Egyptians to speak to people beyond their borders with an intellectual, analytical, nuanced voice, often tackling issues that would otherwise not get attention in the international media. These newly untethered journalists put emphasis on the post-uprising day-to-day struggles, as well as on more mainstream coverage of street battles, sectarian strife, and rape. Like a handful of news organizations in Egypt today, Egypt Independent lured a new generation of journalists that were not schooled in the art of self-censorship, once a necessity to operate safely as a reporter in Egypt. The paper’s closure has made headlines around the world, as it represents a blatant setback for a revolution hard fought and now, seemingly, coming apart at the seams. ![]() ![]() “This kind of press played an important role in the wave of contentious politics that started in 2005 and onwards,” said Lina Attalah, editor in chief of the now defunct Egypt Independent. Opened four years ago as an English language division to privately owned Arabic daily El Masry El Youm, the newspaper was one of few that chronicled the real beginnings of the Egyptian revolution, from the economic deterioration to the death of Khaled Said, brutally beaten to death by police in Alexandria in 2010-coverage of which went viral on social media websites, planting the seed for the Janupopular uprising. A statement from the editorial staff read: Four years after the birth of Egypt Independent, the management of Al-Masry Media Corporation has informed our editorial team that our print and online news operation is being shut down.īecause we owe it to our readers, we decided to put together a closing edition, which would have been available on 25 April, to explain the conditions under which a strong voice of independent and progressive journalism in Egypt is being terminated. On April 25, after weeks of international campaigns and fundraisers, the executive management of the Independent abruptly pulled the plug on its operations, days earlier than scheduled. A cry for help by the newspaper’s editors earlier this year cited “the current economic crisis” as reason for the looming closure of the country’s most highly respected English-language newspaper, as well as the “political limitations manifested in rising restrictions on freedom of expression” since the election of President Mohamed Morsi. Like many things in Egypt these days, the fight to save the Egypt Independent from termination went viral almost instantly. ![]()
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