| A thin quota of bread, fuel and natural gas, amid a national shortage of resources, is causing divide and violence between the residents of Al Minya’s Ettssa |
| By Nadine El Sayed |
| Amidst the daily drama that is the news updates from post-January 25 Cairo, few have stopped to notice events outside the capital unless they are groundbreaking. It has been especially Cairo-centric during the January 28 weekend with sit-ins in Tahrir Square and protests in Maspero, with the occasional violence between protesters and residents here and there spicing it all up a notch.That is why escalating events in the small town of Ettssa in Al Minya governorate have gone largely unnoticed in the local press. A fuel, natural gas and bread crisis in Ettsa is threatening the locals’ daily lives and causing a large divide between the small town’s inhabitants. On Friday, January 27, a friend, Dina Sherif* was visiting Al Minya, when she texted the following to Egypt Today: “Al Minya is in chaos, roads are cut and violent demonstrations are being held because there is no gas or fuel — not even a drop for me to come back to Cairo, and we are all bound to our rooms for security reasons.” *The name has been changed upon the source’s request. It sounded like another long queue at the gas stations like the ones seen in Cairo a couple of weeks earlier. But a few hours later, Sherif and her group, who were heading from central Minya to Ettssa, had to hide from angry mobs. On their way to Ettssa, a group of people with torches and swords stopped their car, along with all other cars on the highway, and kept them from getting into town or leaving the area. “It is bigger than gas and fuel,”Sherif texted. “They want to divide Ettssa to southern and northern [parts.] It is turning into a riot and we are hiding in a field until rescue comes.” Seeing an elderly woman and two children in the car with Sherif, the group of protestors debated among themselves about whether they should let the car go through or keep them until the situation is solved. As the two sides argued, one group guided them to a remote field until the situation calmed down. Local Divide Locals were setting fires all along the Ettssa highway connecting Upper Egypt and cutting off the road using fires and swords to threaten by-passers in a bid to get their message across to the governor. Ettssa is geographically divided by the train track that connects Ettssa and Aswan, but it is still considered one town; therefore, the bread, gas and fuel rations are to be distributed to the whole town. However, by the time the already scarce quotas make it from Ettssa north across the tracks to the southern part of the town, there usually isn't enough goods to meet the needs of the people in the southern neighborhoods. So when a national shortage of gas and fuel hit the country, southern Ettssa was hit the hardest. Ettssa has to be separated into two towns with two separate quotas; a northern and southern Ettssa was the people’s verdict — at least, that was the southern Ettssa people’s verdict. The protests started at noon, and by 9 pm Al Minya Governor Serag El Din Al Rouby had made his way to Ettssa. After hearing the locals’ complaints, the Minya governor declared that the town would now be separated into Ettssa and Ettssa Al Mahatta (Ettssa the Station) to ensure a fairer quota distribution. “We hear cheers,” texted Sherif. Soon after, Sherif and her group were out celebrating with the locals, drinking sharbat and joining in on the dances — only the people of northern Ettssa weren't half as happy with the divide. The next morning, the situation escalated again as people from Northern Ettssa, now Ettssa Al Mahatta, made their way to the train tracks and blocked the railway, holding two trains in front of each other for over a day. Trapped passengers had nothing to do but sit tight, in Upper Egypt’s freezing cold, and wait until the north and the south reconciled. “The funny thing is, today’s demonstration is an objection to yesterday’s decision by the [southern] Ettssa El Mahatta people,” texted Sherif. “So we expect the governor to agree to [northern Ettssa’s] demands, accordingly, [the southern] people will cut the roads again today and we will just keep running in circles.” The trains were finally able to move by noon on Sunday, and after a day spent trapped in a train, not being able to go anywhere as they were surrounded by water ditches and vast fields, passengers were on their way home. “The trains moved [Sunday] afternoon and the governor told [the people of Northern Ettssa] that the decision isn’t final and [promised them] a bridge,” says Sherif in her interview with Egypt Today on Monday morning . Frustrated from the southern demands to separate the town in two, a move bound to decrease their bread, fuel and gas quotas, northern Ettssa residents decided to give their southern neighbors the silent treatment and demanded a bridge be constructed to go over south Ettssa so they don’t have to pass through the other part of town. But the situation is far from settled. Bread and gas are becoming scarcer, the rift between the locals is getting bigger and the residents are getting angrier by the hour. “The gas and fuel crisis is far worse now,” one Ettssa resident told Sherif on Monday. Sherif adds that she can’t imagine what the locals are doing now as the queues at gas stations and bread outlets were already getting violent on Friday as disputants brandished knives. At press time, the situation in Ettssa remains largely unresolved, with no indication of whether the governor will stick to his decision to divide the town, or more importantly what will happen to the people of a town split by basic needs to eat, drive and cook. |
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