4 customs employees in Port Said to be tried for fraud, wasting public funds

CAIRO – 24 March 2019: The Administrative Prosecution ordered an urgent trial for four employees in the Port Said Customs Authority over fraud that caused authorities to lose over LE 1.2 million, the value of customs duties.

Further information about the identity of the workers has not yet been revealed.

In January 2019, the General Prosecution ordered detaining Marsa Matrouh governorate's former secretary general and two other former officials for 15 days over allowing unlawful seizure of public funds estimated at LE 500 million ($28.3 million).

Egypt's Administrative Control Authority (ACA) – the regulatory body responsible for enforcing laws and regulations within state bodies – announced in a Facebook post on January 31 the arrest of the governorate's former secretary general, assistant secretary general and head of the legal affairs department.

The three former officials face numerous charges related to facilitating the theft of public funds,forging, generating illicit profits for others, and misusing powers, the ACA said.

Earlier in November, President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi met with Major General Sherif Seif el-Din, chairman of the ACA, to discuss the national anti-corruption strategy.

The ACA announced that its efforts during December resulted in seizing LE 12.8 billion, along with arresting 30 defendants accused of bribery and embezzlement.

In a statement, the ACA added that an international network of human trafficking, which included 20 Egyptian, Arab and European defendants, was uncovered earlier in December.

The ACA announced on the same day that a tourism company owner, a lawyer and a mechanic who claimed to be a lawyer were arrested for seizing LE 25 million using fake documents. All three defendants were arrested.

The ACA stated that the three defendants managed to fabricate documents that allowed them to drop the debt of the tourism company amounting to LE 25 million at one of the private banks.

In the same context, the ACA also announced that several officials of South Cairo Electricity Distribution Company and Omrania neighborhood in Giza were arrested as a result of receiving LE 200,000 as a bribe.