Demotix/Hussein Tallal. All rights reserved.Ever since the coup of July 2013 and the election of President Abdel Fattah El Sisi in 2014, the Egyptian regime has become increasingly autocratic.
Parliamentary elections only finally took place over the past few weeks, more than a year after Sisi came to power. Both executive and legislative powers have been and still are in the hands of the president, and laws are being issued by decree. This includes a number of repressive laws that have generated much controversy, namely the anti-terrorism law, and the anti-protest law. The latter, even though issued before Sisi’s election, was kept in place and Sisi has openly voiced his support for it.
This has been accompanied by the repression of civil society and the labour movement, reversing all the gains made during the late Mubarak era and during the post-revolutionary period. Resistance to labour repression has manifested itself in the recent Mahalla textile worker strikes, a traditional hotbed for labour militarism against low wages and corruption.
