A few days ago, the fifth anniversary of the creation of the Suez Canal came, on which the Egyptian authority and its supporters had hopes to bring prosperity to the Egyptians, some of whom had invested their savings and invested in them in the hope of improving their economic situation.

After the Egyptian pound was floated at the end of 2016, it lost two-thirds of its purchasing value (the dollar jumped to about 18 pounds, then today it fell to 16 pounds, after it was equal to about 6 pounds at the time of starting digging the fork).

Hajj Ammar’s pain is renewed with every anniversary of the opening of the tafriya, whose fifth anniversary a few days ago, and he summoned the details of what he did, telling Al-Jazeera Net that he feels that the government “has taken advantage of him and is planning from the beginning to float the pound, and it will not lose, but rather it will gain from the difference between the money transfer between the dollar and the pound before The float and after it, "as he put it.

As for Karim - who is an importer of photographic equipment - he also feels very angry at the recession that has stifled the country's economy as a result of withdrawing liquidity from the hands of the people and placing it in the branch project. From the deterioration of the conditions of the people, especially the merchants, and despite that we were attached to the hope that it might improve after the opening and increase the revenues of the channel, but "the recession stabilized and continued, and the situation worsened more, and Sisi does not want to admit the mistake of his hasty decisions."

The government collected about 64 billion pounds from the Egyptians to dig the branch (about 10 billion dollars at the time), and the amount was not enough, so it borrowed about 850 million dollars from local banks, while the state's general budget bore about 7.6 billion pounds annually, which is the amount of debt service for 64 billion that was collected.

The economic expert, Mustafa Shaheen, explained that the study of global economic conditions at the time confirmed the need to postpone the project, given that the global economy was going through a clear slowdown, in addition to many indicators that confirmed the efforts of the major countries to find alternatives to the Suez Canal as a whole, including the establishment of a train linking China and Europe.

Speaking to Al-Jazeera Net, Shaheen added that it was not expected to achieve any returns from the branch, according to the feasibility studies, as the canal had not reached its peak traffic stage, in order to justify digging the additional branch by reducing congestion, facilitating traffic and achieving greater revenues.

He pointed out that the channel's numbers during the past five years have not witnessed a significant improvement in revenues, which embarrassed the system that optimistic about achieving $ 100 billion in annual revenues, and the numbers remained around $ 5 billion annually, while tourism revenue kept achieving $ 13 billion, and the returns of Egyptians abroad. 29 billion, and the two did not burden the state budget like the branch.

Shaheen - who is also a professor of economics at the University of Oakland in the US - said that the project represented a pressure on foreign exchange earnings at the Central Bank of Egypt, according to the admission of former Central Bank President Hisham Ramez.

Shaheen explained that what was paid from the country's cash reserve in the project amounted to about $ 8 billion within a year, instead of 3 years, forcing the government in the end to the decision to float the pound, the devaluation of the local currency to a third, and the increase of the inflation rate to 36%, and the rise in prices With lower incomes.

Navigation experts said that the new branch has not achieved complete duplication of the new canal, as ships still have to wait in the Bitter Lakes, and follow the method of convoys to pass, stressing that the doubling of the canal's profits is linked to the international trade movement and not to the expansion of the shipping route, while international trade traffic increases by 3% Just about every year, before it fell to its worst levels in months due to the emerging corona virus attack.

The report of the American Economic Network, Bloomberg, said that the "Suez Canal Expansion" project meant that "Egypt wastes $ 8 billion on an expansion of the Suez Canal, which the world does not need."

The report pointed out that the project would theoretically double the volume of transit traffic in the Suez Canal, but the movement in it is not at this size at present, as the volume of global and European trade in particular has been declining since 2005.

Official reports

On the other hand, official reports said that the new channel branch has contributed to raising the channel's revenues over the past five years to 32 billion and 442 million dollars.

The total annual revenues of the canal ranged between $ 4.9 billion at a minimum, and $ 5 billion and 750 million annually in its maximum over the past five years, a figure close to the last revenue achieved by the canal in 2010, before the expansion.

According to the head of the Suez Canal Authority, Mohab Mamish - in his statements in 2015 - the project will increase the income of the canal in the first two years (until 2017) to reach $ 8 billion annually (which did not happen) and then increase by 2023 to $ 13.4 billion annually.

The Media Center of the Council of Ministers denied what was reported in some local and foreign media and social media pages, about news of the payment of the debts of the Suez Canal Authority estimated at 600 million pounds from the new state budget 2019-2020, after the authority's inability to pay.

Recognition and justification

As for the data of the Canal Authority, we find an acknowledgment of the decline in revenues from what was hoped, with the reason being attributed to the low global trade movement, the sharp decline in oil prices, the slowdown in the growth rates of the Chinese economy, and the failure of the eurozone yet to achieve the desired economic take-off.

After the opening of the branch, the Suez Canal Authority used to publish the revenue numbers in pounds instead of dollars, to show a significant increase in the numbers.

For his part, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi tried to justify the failure to fulfill what the authority promised regarding the new channel, saying that the main goal of the project was to raise the morale of the Egyptians.

Memish had stated that Sisi surprised him on the air while reviewing the implementation stages and fixing the period at 36 months, with the phrase "it is a year", which increased the cost in a marvelous expression.

In statements to the local media, the current Minister of Transport, Kamel al-Wazir - who was head of the Engineering Authority for the Armed Forces at the time of the implementation of the project - said that Sisi refused the three-year period to dig the canal on the night of the announcement of the project, and asked to shorten the period by only two years, continuing: "However, I was surprised on the air. During the celebration of the president’s announcement of completing the digging of the new Suez Canal within one year.

Kamel pointed out that Sisi had considered digging the new Suez Canal "one week after his assumption of power," in contrast to Memish's statement that the offer to drill came from the authority.

The new branch of the Suez Canal - which was inaugurated on August 6, 2015 - extends 35 km in length, in addition to expanding and deepening the branches of the Mura and Al-Balah lakes.

The new branch in the opening and the anniversary was officially celebrated, which its predecessors did not enjoy along the shipping course, despite the numerous expansion and drilling projects. In 1980 alone, 3 branches were opened: the Port Said branch with a length of 40.1 km, the Al Timsah branch with a length of 4.3 km, and the Differswar branch with a length of 8.4 km, in addition to other branches.