Mubarak Ally Offers Half His Fortune for Reconciliation

The “father of Sharm El-Sheikh” pleads to come back. Mubarak-era tycoon Hussein Salem offered to pay the government half his fortune to reach reconciliation, as he faces two retrials for squandering public funds and illegally selling electricity during the Mubarak regime.

According to his lawyer Mahmoud Kebeish, the billionaire sent a request to the country's premier last Sunday offering to pay 4.6 billion EGP in exchange for reaching a reconciliation, Ahram Online reported. Salem fled Egypt shortly after the January 25th revolution that ousted the former autocrat and currently resides in Spain, where he holds citizenship.  

Salem, an ally and former advisor of Mubarak, had been given a 10 year sentence for collaborating with Mubarak to illegally acquire the rights to export Egyptian natural gas to Israel at below market rates, but was acquitted in November 2014. He is currently facing two retrials on charges of illegally acquiring land, squandering public funds and illegally selling electricity, in addition to a pending investigation on illicit gains.

Article 18 of the criminal court allows the country’s premier to create a reconciliation committee if a defendant or his lawyer requests it, his lawyer Mahmoud Kebeish told Ahram Online. The business tycoon had already offered half his fortune, valued at 8 billion EGP, to the Muslim Brotherhood government in exchange for dropping all charges against him, and again to the interim government in January 2014, but the deal was never reached.  

Image courtesy of Al Jazeera.