CAIRO: Part of a newly announced economic aid package the UK has promised Egypt will go into ensuring balanced media coverage during the elections, the UK Deputy Prime Minister said Thursday.
The aid to media organizations will come from a larger package of £5 million in grants, which the UK government will be giving to Egypt through the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Over £0.5 million of the funds will go, UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg explained, towards "extra support" to "allow for reform and improvements in the way in which events in Egypt are objectively covered by media organizations."
Coverage of female candidates needs to be improved, he added during a visit to Cairo.
Describing the need for “independence and objectivity, particularly in broadcast media,” Clegg mentioned the events of Oct. 9, when state media reported that Coptic protesters had attacked the army and called upon Egyptians to “protect the army,” which many saw as inflammatory.
“I know there’s been controversy here about those events on Oct. 9,” Clegg said, “about how that was portrayed in the broadcast media." Egypt, with the help of the aid package, must "raise broadcast standards wherever possible."
In a meeting with Pope Shenouda this week, Egypt’s information minister apologized for the “professional mistakes” committed by state-TV in its coverage of the Oct. 9 protests.
Clegg discussed the aid package at a town hall-style meeting with activists in Zamalek on Thursday, where he offered comments and answered questions ranging from the philosophical to the pragmatic on Egypt’s democratic transition.
"This is not a lecture," said Thom Reilly, deputy head of mission for the British Embassy in Cairo. Clegg held the meeting, Reilly explained, to dialogue with activists, and get a feel for their hopes and concerns.
As Egypt proceeds with elections, Reilly said, the UK “will not be a silent friend, but a critical one.”
After congratulating the activists, who represented various political parties, for ousting Hosni Mubarak, Clegg waxed philosophical about the future.
“Politics is the marriage of ideals with organization. Without one, you can’t deliver the other,” he told the activists. “And that is why I think this phase between now and next month should be about strengthening your organizational ability…in all corners of the country."
Speaking at a press conference shortly after the meeting with activists, Clegg was asked whether the British government had reached out to the Muslim Brotherhood. Clegg responded that although some youth members of the Brotherhood had attended the prior meeting, "it is not a relationship which is organized at a senior or political level."
The UK is the largest foreign investor in Egypt.
“I make no apology,” he told the activists, “for pointing out that our prosperity is linked to Egypt’s success too.”
