President orders specialized committee to investigate Cairo’s Ramses Exchange fire

CAIRO – 9 July 2025: President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has instructed the formation of a specialized committee to investigate the causes of the fire that erupted at Ramses Exchange in downtown Cairo on Monday.

Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly highlighted the president’s directives in a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday in the wake of the massive fire that claimed the lives of four workers and injured dozens more.

The prime minister stressed the importance of promptly completing various tasks and measures to ensure the restoration of services provided through the exchange building to their normal levels and quality.

Madbouly also extended his appreciation and gratitude to the civil defense and ambulance personnel for their tireless efforts in responding to the incident and for their work in extinguishing the fire that affected the building.

The bodies of the four engineers who died during the fire were recovered from the scene on Monday.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health said on Tuesday that 27 of the 32 injured individuals who arrived at hospitals were discharged after their conditions stabilized.

Preliminary examinations indicated that the fire was likely caused by an electrical short circuit, a security source told the Egyptian state news agency MENA. Forensic experts will collect evidence from the fire scene to determine its causes.

The source also noted that civil protection personnel successfully prevented the fire from spreading to the entire central office building and the roofs of adjacent structures.

The communications minister said yesterday that the Ramses exchange, a pillar of Egypt's information system, is currently unusable until cooling and complete extinguishing processes are completed.

Earlier today, Madbouly visited the Ramses Exchange and ordered an assessment of the building’s structural safety.

The fire, which erupted on Monday, temporarily disrupted phone and internet services, as well as some banking operations and online transactions, and led the Egyptian stock exchange to suspend trading on the following day.

Internet watchdog group NetBlocks reported that national connectivity in Egypt dropped to 62% of ordinary levels, according to Reuters.

However, Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat has conveyed a message of reassurance on the restoration of communication and banking services for most citizens nationwide with work underway to ensure return to normal quality.