The Fall of the Turkish Lira and the Steadfastness of the Egyptian Pound

An-Nahar, Lebanon, December 20

The people of Egypt haven’t forgotten how members of the Muslim Brotherhood practiced what they believed to be jihad, armed themselves, pursued political tricks and games, committed crimes, and targeted their media platforms for a long time to win the battle to bring down the Egyptian pound and devalue it in the face of other currencies. After the Egyptian people’s revolution against the rule of the Brotherhood, surviving members of the organization did everything in their power to further devalue the Egyptian pound and rob the Egyptian people of their money. Many took out large sums of cash in US dollars in order to limit its circulation in the Egyptian market, to smuggle it, or to resell it at home at exorbitant rates. They seized every citizen who wanted to buy an apartment, car, or plot of land and tempted him to buy US dollars at a price that far exceeds the exchange rate. When the Egyptian government decided to float the pound and put it freely in banks, the Brotherhood was immediately injured. Shocked, they quickly changed their plans, hoping to find other ways to topple the regime and restore their own control over Egypt. But the Egyptian pound has held and the Brotherhood hasn’t returned to the presidential palace. They’ve taken their crisis elsewhere, to Turkey, where the local currency entered an unprecedented freefall. In the name of religion, the Brotherhood is now busy begging people for donations that would help the Turkish economy. How hypocritical that just a few months ago, Muslim Brotherhood members did everything they could to sabotage their country’s very own currency and then celebrated the downfall of the Egyptian pound. Now, they’re grieved by the collapse of the Turkish lira. But the good news is that, despite the Brotherhood’s best efforts, the US dollar is back in full circulation in the Egyptian economy, which is quickly recovering. Meanwhile, the Brotherhood’s efforts to salvage the Turkish lira are yielding no result. –Mohamed Salah (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)