Headline News 24/01/2018

Headlines

• Sisi Battles for Survival

• Global Inequality Grows

• US Government Shutdown Again

Details

Sisi Battles for Survival

With an economy in freefall and a looming election in March, Abdul Fattah al-Sisi has lost much of the good faith the Egyptian people placed in him in 2013. Resorting to the tactics of Hosni Mubarak who always rigged elections to keep himself in power. Ahmed Shafiq the former head of Egypt's intelligence Service pulled out running for the president after confirming he was threatened with a smear campaign. Mohamed Anwar Sadat, a dissident and nephew of the late president of the same name, confirmed he would not stand either because the climate was not right for free elections. This week Egypt's army reportedly arrested former chief of staff Sami Anan for "incitement" days after he announced his intention to run against al-Sisi in the upcoming presidential election. Sisi lacks any of the attributes that made the presidencies of his predecessors. His language and behaviour reveal the extremely humble capabilities of an army officer who rose at a time of Egyptian military decline, without having had any political qualifications. That’s why he doesn't hesitate to shed the blood of thousands of Egyptians as seen in the incidents at the Republican Guards Club. What all of this reveals is that Sisi is too weak to accept any level of electoral challenge.

Global Inequality Grows

Oxfam the development charity published its annual inequality report on Monday 22 January. The damming report, published to coincide with the gathering of some of the world's richest people at the World Economic Forum in Davos. The report confirmed 42 people hold as much wealth as 3.7 billion people in the world. It also highlighted 82% of the global wealth generated in 2017 went to the wealthiest 1% of the world's population. A number of pro-Capitalism supporters tried to challenge the methodology of these figures, but the Chief executive of Oxfam, Mark Goldring highlighted, "However you look at it, this is an unacceptable level of inequality." The number of scandals over the past few years are testament the level of global inequality as papers such as the Paradise and Panama eases revealed, the rich pay little in taxes, leaving the poor to pick up the tab.

US Government Shutdown Again

US President Donald Trump celebrated the indignity of his one year anniversary as president with the government in shutdown. The appropriations bill (budget) - had to be passed by Congress and signed by President Donald Trump by midnight on Friday 19 January. As this did not happen an agreement on spending the federal government effectively closes its doors. Republicans are calling it the Schumer shutdown, blaming Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer, who led the Democrats to block the bill.

But Democrats say they had a deal on immigration - a major sticking point - before the president backed out. The petty political point scoring between the politicians in the US knows no bounds as they have no qualms in the whole government shutting down just for their personal gains.