November 2022
Dear Old Victorian,
In a rejoiceful atmosphere the Old Victorians resumed their monthly reunions and cultural functions at 7:30 pm on November 9 in the elite Automobile Club downtown Cairo, after a very long period of stoppage because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The reunion was attended by some 40 Old Victorians and spouses. The speaker of the month was the renown strategic analyst General Doctor Samir Farag. The speaker was introduced to the audience by the president of the association Mr Monir Doss VCC 1958.
The scheme of Gen Farag’s session was “Egypt 2022 and beyond”. The famous strategic analyst displayed a map using an overhead projector and indicated the threats against Egypt from the four main geographic directions, he pointed out that the only and main threat against Egypt throughout history in the past, always came from the North East, he added that “it will remain coming from that direction but without neglecting other directions especially the North” Gen Farag analyzed the factors of threats from each direction and clarified briefly the countermeasures taken by Egypt, he concluded the essentiality of Egypt keeping to be militarily the strongest country in the area and the tenth strongest worldwide.
Dr Farag then elaborated, using the map of Africa, on the importance of Djibouti to the southern entrance of the Red Sea and the Suez Canal and noted that Djibouti is the only country that has military bases from four superpowers. He then shed light on Egypt’s construction and building of the US $ 2.9 Billion Tanzanian Dam and its hydropower station on the Rufiji River and its importance not only to Tanzania but also to its eight other Nile Basin and East African neighboring countries through providing them with electricity that Ethiopia had planned to provide to them from its Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam GERD. He added that Egypt will also help Tanzania to cultivate vast areas of fertile land with great hopes that Africa will reach self sufficiency in agricultural produce and crops.
On international relations worldwide Dr Farag outlined the Egyptian-US relations during the reign of several US presidents. He displayed a video of a conference held by Condoleezza Rice the US ex-Secretary of State where she admitted the role of her administration in “The Arab Spring” adding that it was an Autumn not a Spring.
Gen Farag then tackled the Ukrainian-Russian war highlighting the positions of Russia, Europe and the USA and the motives and targets of each party from that war, he emphasized that Putin is relying on “General Winter” and the peoples of Europe to help him win that war.
A session of Q & A followed that seemed to never end, until Mr Doss got Gen Farag’s promise to meet again with the OVs in the near future. The very interesting and enlightening session lasted for 75 minutes.
A very delicious dinner was served, it reflected our famous hotelier Mr Doss’s talent in designing the menu served; but who can do that better anyway?
Because of the rush in making reservations for that reunion, and the difficulty to accept all the requests as availability was limited to first callers only, it was suggested that reservations in future functions be offered first to association members who paid their membership fees, and after fulfilling the members requests, reservation could then be opened to other non-members and friends.
The reunion concluded a little past 10:00 p.m with high expectations for the forthcoming reunion and guest speaker during December (rumors were heard that it will be held on one of the steamships on the great River Nile).
Best Regards
OVA Egypt