The women’s names are: Kareema Abdel Fattah, Safeyya Muhammad and Mona el-Sayyed.

[Women from Qale’t el-Kabsh slum reading the new issue of The Socialist, Cairo’s Press Syndicate. Photo by Hossam el-Hamalawy.]

Speakers in the closing session included women from the Qale’t el-Kabsh slum who spoke about their plight, government corruption, police crackdowns, detentions, mistreatment, and resistance…

[Om Refa’i speaking about the struggle of Qale’t el-Kabsh slum residents, Socialist Days 2007 Finale, Cairo’s Press Syndicate. Photo by Hossam el-Hamalawy.]

Muhammad el-Nahhass, an activist involved in Burullus’ “Revolution of the Thirsty” fascinated the audience with stories about the bravery of the fishermen’s community in fighting the government which refuses to provide them with the basic necessities including drinking water…

[Muhammad el-Nahhass, an artist and activist from the northern province of Burullus, speaking about the struggle of the mass anti-govt demonstrations in Burullus this year, protesting govt corruption. Photo by Hossam el-Hamalawy.]

Last but not least, were the speakers from the Real Estate Tax Collectors’ strike…

The first speaker, named Mostafa, took the microphone and said: “The problem of this country is capitalism.” I almost fainted.. A tax collector denouncing capitalism?! This was the equivalent of some Sheikh declaring God is dead, I thought..

[Mostafa speaking about the Real Estate Tax Collectors’ Strike, Socialist Days 2007 Finale, Cairo’s Press Syndicate. Photo by Hossam el-Hamalawy.]

The press conference which followed the closing session was even stronger, as a contingent from the Tax strikers moved from their open-ended sit-in in front the Ministerial Cabinet building in downtown Cairo to join us at the syndicate…

Veteran Socialist Kamal Khalil assumed the stage together with his long-time friend Kamal Abu Eita who is part of the Higher Committee for the Real Estate Tax Officers Strike that is running the 55,000-strong strike in the absence of the Union Committee whose state-backed officials betrayed the strikers..

Kimo gave a very passionate speech as always… Saluting the strikers, declaring the solidarity of the Socialists and other political forces with their struggle, spoke of how the Egyptian workers are becoming a model for militancy and direct action against oppression which is inspiring the students and civil servants to follow suit…

Kimo’s speech moved the strikers, and he was interrupted several times by applause and chants…

…chants that were similar to those we heard in Ghazl el-Mahalla…

On my way out of the syndicate I received news that hundreds of civil servants at the Workers’ University were staging a sit-in at Darrassa had started a sit-in demanding the allowances and bonuses the new university dean had decided to cut back. I called one of the civil servants taking part in the sit-in to get the details of their demands and find out more about the situation (I’ll post more about it later). Two hundred of them were sleeping over in the university offices. In the morning they were 900 taking part. “The women and old men had to go home to their families, but they are returning in the morning,” said the civil servant. The leaders of the industrial action were in negotiations with State Security officers and govt officials at the Workers’ University’s HQ in Nasr City. They were promised a reply in 24 hours. “If our demands are not met by today,” the civil servant said, “our action will spread to the other ten branches of the university in the provinces. We will be more than 3,500 civil servants taking part.”

My confidence in overcoming Mubarak’s US-backed dictatorship grows day by day…

UPDATE: I phoned an activist who’s present now at the protest. She says more than 200 persons are demonstrating, after they were told unofficially by the Prosecutor that he will not pursue the case, filed by the residents and the Egyptian Center for Housing Rights, to investigate the process by which the local municipality and the Cairo Governorate authorities manipulated the compensations for the burnt down houses and those demolished. “There are dozens who are still sleeping in the street, waiting for flats,” the activist said. I could hear some of the chants over the phone: “Suzan (Mubarak)! Say the truth! Do we have flats or not?!”

“The Government (officials) are thieves and looters!”

There were also a chant about Gamal Mubarak, but neither I nor the activist on the phone could hear it properly.

For previous postings and videos of the Qale’t el-Kabsh slum protests, check this dossier.

The man was bitterly complaining.

“Drinking water, specially during the summer, is not always available. I’ve been living in this place for eight years, and it’s always been bad. But since last year it became totally unbearable.

“We get water for four hours a day usually. Then one day yes, the other day no. And then, it disappears for a week. I open the tap, and there is nothing coming down.

“Last summer the women in the neighborhood assembled, and demonstrated in front of the municipality. And as you know, our women are, excuse me, baladi women… so they were using slurs and foul language against the municipality officials. State Security came. It was a big fuss. But the women stayed on. I can’t remember which day it was. It was the beginning of the summer. But what I remember is that the following day water was running through our pipes again.

“Two weeks ago, we did not have water, then it came back last Saturday, only to be cut again on the following day. Last Tuesday the women assembled again. Some men were present too, but most were women. The municipality promised us they’ll solve the problem. On the following day, they got us fanatees (water transported in metal containers, usually for irrigation)! Man, try to drink that water. It’s even too dirty to wash your clothes in it.

“We are dreaming of water. I want some water! God, it’s water that I’m talking about here. I’m not talking about even getting a bigger space for me, my wife and three children. No one knows where the water is going. We hear rumors. Some say the investors in Obour City made a deal with someone or bribed the municipality engineers to divert our water pipes to serve the Obour factories instead of our neighborhood.”

Finally, dear readers, guess where the Qale’t el-Kabsh slum residents are being moved to? Yep, the govt is resettling the fire victims to El-Nahda to keep dreaming of water.

The protesters chanted against the government, accusing officials of being “liars, thieves, corrupt…” and blasted Suzan Mubarak, who loves to present herself as a the “mother of Egyptians,” accusing her of being a “liar.”

I was in downtown around noon, when I received unconfirmed news that new clashes broke out between the slum residents who still haven’t been compensated by the government for their burnt down houses. The unconfirmed news also included the killing of a woman by the police. I was also told the slum dwellers were going to carry the woman’s body and demonstrate in Tahrir Sq.

I waited for roughly half an hour in the square, without witnessing anything, but then I assumed may be the protesters decided to try demonstrating in front of the parliament like last time. I started running to el-Qasr el-Eini St, and indeed the traffic had come to halt as a group of slum residents managed to assemble in front of the parliament.

The police was PANICKING, and tried to disperse the reporters and the curious citizens who approached the crowd. But then they left the reporters alone.

It turned out no one was killed. A woman had been severely injured by the police while protesting earlier in the day in front of the Red Crescent relief building, where the local municipality should be receiving the requests for the compensations and the alternative housing schemes. Frustrated by sleeping in the open air day after day since she lost her house, the woman started shouting, so she was attacked by the police, who beat her up. Blood covered her dress. After going into a coma, the residents thought she died, so they vented their anger at the police and government, and marched with her body in El-Qasr el-Eini St, till they assembled in front of the parliament.

The residents accused the local municipality of corruption. “Only those who pay LE5000 as a bribe receives the government-provided alternative housing,” said one of the demonstrators. The same figure was repeated to me several times by other demonstrators.

There were State Security and Qasr el-Nil Police Station officers present. They were taking down the names of the women present in the demo, claiming they will look into their cases and make sure they were prioritized. Some of the women volunteered their names, but others refused saying the police wants to find out their names only to take their men as hostages, like they did before.

I’ll upload more video clips later.

The government did find an alternative housing for only 100 families last Monday, resettling them in El-Nahda neighborhood, Madinet el-Salam. On the same day, Central Security Forces raided the slum again, and rounded up roughly 70 men, and took them in two prison trucks, throwing one group in the desert on the Cairo-Suez road and another near Tora, south of Cairo. They were warned if they demonstrate again, “they’ll be taken behind the sun,” according to a leftist activist who is in touch with the slum community leaders.

The protesters tried to gather in front of the People’s Assembly, but were chased by the security forces, so they descended on el-Qasr el-Eini St. A Socialist activist who witnessed the protest told me he (and a group of activists) bumped around 3pm into the crowd, largely composed of baladi women, near the American University of Cairo. He said the women were chanting repeatedly: “Ya Hokouma Weskha! Ya Hokouma Me3arassa!” (You dirty government! You government of pimps!) and “El-sahafa fein? El-ta3rees ahoh!” (Where’s the press? Look at the pimps!) while pointing at the dozens of State Security agents who appeared.

Scuffles continued till the protesters were cornered in front of the KFC joint facing Tahrir by the CSF troops and plainclothes SS officers. The police promised the residents the government would find a solution to their problems by Sunday. The protesters were then allowed to leave one by one out of the security cordon, only to reassemble in downtown again, and march over Bab el-Louq, repeating the same chants, joined by a number of Kefaya activists.

Karama Party activist and photographer Peter Alfred was briefly detained for 15 minutes by security agents inside the entrance of one of downtown’s buildings.

The residents are threatening to march over the parliament on Sunday if the government promises turn out to be bogus.