Mubarak ally found guilty of corruption

He became a symbol of the intertwining of business and politics which many Egyptians despised as corrupt, helping fuel the anti-Mubarak uprising.

Ezz appeared in court wearing a prison uniform behind a defendants’ cage. He can appeal against the corruption conviction.

Former trade minister Rachid Mohammed Rachid, who remains at large, was sentenced to 15 years in jail in his absence and ordered to pay a 237 million dollar fine for approving production licences to Ezz without auctioning them publicly first.

Rachid was convicted along with two businessmen earlier this year of squandering public funds and profiteering in a separate case. In that case, he was sentenced in absentia to five years in prison and ordered to pay nearly 800,000 dollars.

Yesterday’s verdict revoked the licences of Ezz Steel and the Egyptian Sponge Iron and Steel Co.

The government said in a statement that it would protect the rights of investors and do what it could to stabilise the stock market, after news of the verdicts played into investors’ fears. The stock market closed down 2.69%.

Ezz was arrested in February, days after Mubarak was toppled by mass protests. Among the key demands of Egyptian protesters was an end to corruption and payoffs which favoured officials and businessmen close to the ousted president. Watchdog groups allege that top officials and tycoons were involved in sweetheart deals in the Mubarak era, and that the Mubaraks were major beneficiaries of that system.

As a key official in the former ruling party, Ezz often spoke vehemently in support of the ousted president and was believed to be guiding efforts to promote Mubarak’s son Gamal to inherit the presidency.

He organised the ruling party’s last election campaign, in 2010, which like previous votes saw widespread rigging in favour of regime candidates.

Ezz was long accused by businessman and activists of monopolising the steel industry in Egypt.

He and a number of high-ranking former officials and businessmen, including Mubarak’s two sons, are being held in Cairo’s Tora prison.

Also today, Mubarak and his two sons watched as former interior minister Mahmoud Wagdy, who headed the post briefly during the height of protests, testified in their trial.

Mr Wagdy was head of security during the “camel battle” when scores of men on camels and horses attacked protesters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square in one of the most violent days of the uprising.

Several people were killed in those clashes and a number of Mubarak loyalists, including former parliamentarians and ministers, are on trial for allegedly planning the attack.

In a separate case yesterday, ex-oil minister Sameh Fahmy and seven other defendants face trial on charges related to a natural gas deal with Israel which prosecutors say harmed Egypt’s national interests.

Under the deal, the Cairo-based gas company agreed to sell natural gas to an Israeli company at a price reportedly under market value.

Prosecutors allege that businessman Hussein Salem, whose company is involved in the gas deal, made at least 336 million dollars from the deal and that this came at an even higher cost to Egypt.

Salem has fled the country and is believed to be in Spain. He is being tried in absentia and is also on co-defendant in the Mubarak trial.

The defendants face up to 15 years in jail and fines of hundreds of millions of dollars.

A former oil ministry official, Abdelalim Taha, told the court today that the deal and the price of gas to Israel was not in Egypt’s favour. He said Fahmy offered Israel to sell gas at half the price Israel had requested, and that the deal was approved and signed by Cabinet.

The trial was adjourned until October 26. The court decided to include the testimony of Mubarak’s ex-intelligence chief and vice president Omar Suleiman in this trial’s documents.

Mr Suleiman testified in a secret session on Tuesday in the Mubarak trial, where the long-time leader, his sons and Salem are also facing charges of corruption.