Date: 3 Mar 2011 Comments: 0

Scene 1

I am 20 years old; I live with my parents in the suburbs of Cairo. I left school at 14 and worked carrying bricks for six months, before the site closed down – and found nothing since.

I was in Tariya Square for four nights with my friends; when Mubarrak was thrown out we celebrated for hours, even though we were exhausted.

Two days later I came home; my parents were delighted to see me safe. They were quite excited as well, but wondered what would happen next. My father’s office has been closed for two weeks, so there is no money.

Most of my friends have come back to their homes as well; none of us have jobs. We are used to having lots of ‘free’ time, but somehow it seems worse now. Is it really just a change of old men running the country, in their big offices and big cars? We risked our lives for democracy, but I don’t actually know what to make of it; is this all there is?

I listened to a cleric in the square; he said that the real enemy was America and the wealthy Europeans who come to our country to take our goods and skills – and leave us their over-priced coffee shops and disgusting food. They don’t respect our heritage; they don’t understand our religious ways – and they flaunt their women in our faces.

Maybe he is right. Some of us learned how to make petrol bombs in the square; we are thinking we should perhaps make some more and get rid of the Starbucks and McDonalds – and any other places where foreigners come to laugh at us. Why should they be able to afford such things when we cannot? And our new government? They can afford such places; if they truly represent the people wouldn’t they make them put prices down so we can afford them too? We are the heroes of the revolution – but we have nothing.

And then there is Israel. Our cleric says that this is the greatest insult to us and our Palestinian brothers – we should demand that the peace treaty is over-turned and we should help the resistance forces send bombs into Israel until it is destroyed.

Maybe I should go to the front and help; I don’t have anything else to do.

Scene 2

I am a senior officer in our Central Bank, in charge of our Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Committee. There are 300 of us in Head Office, with a further 500 in branch offices around the country.  We liaise on a frequent basis with Law Enforcement and other government departments. Every three months we have an organized conference session at a hotel at a resort around the country for one week, although I normally have to take a week there before for preparation. I also need a few days afterwards, as the meetings can be quite wearing.

We look at any area where we see possible AML issues and frequently come up with new measures to counter such crime. I am quite often on television, explaining how we have worked on different ID card colors or a fresh advertising program explaining why money laundering is bad. Although the level of money laundering has almost certainly gone up (we cannot really tell as we don’t have much by the way of reliable data), but we appear to be doing at least as well as the Forgery Control section, so I don’t expect any loss of status. Indeed, we agreed at the last quarterly meeting we would put in for an extra ten middle-ranking officers to be brought in.

We try to keep up with technology issues as some people say that criminals are using this internet thing and now they are even talking about doing something with mobile phones.  We are looking to fast-track (that is an expression that is very popular now in government to show the urgency we feel) our position on this. I have requested an exploratory sub-committee to consider a specific agenda item for the Spring 2013 quarterly meeting in this regard, which gives a good idea as to how serious we are about it.

Scene 3

As the newly elected President of my country I am ready to take the emergency measures to create a stable society. My primary task is to create a fair system of taxation and benefits, so we narrow the wide gap that exists between rich and poor. And I want to do that in as clear a way as possible, so we do not allow highly paid consultants to find ways around the regulations for their rich clients.

We know the danger of putting in plans to spend money we don’t have; I cannot permit a situation where we have to borrow to finance this, so we need to raise the money from taxes.

Some of the key points are:

1. There will be a 50% income tax (on all earnings) on amounts over ten times the national minimum wage. For example, if the minimum wage for this year is the equivalent of $15,000, then the 50% rate comes in at $150,000 for the more fortunate.
2. VAT will go up on all goods and services to 20%. This will help raise considerable revenue, particularly from the wealthy.
3. To offset higher food prices (caused by the 50% increase in basic food ingredients) and the higher VAT, all people earning up to double the minimum wage will receive a 40% discount on food. This discount will be reimbursed onto the electronic format of payment made. Note; cash purchases will not get this discount, as the validity of the transaction cannot be created. (Any merchant that tries to avoid paying VAT will not be able to sell anyone in this group, as they would not get their discount reimbursed.)
4. Transfer pricing at other than the ‘real’ cost base will be banned, with fines of ten times the assessed shortfall in taxes paid being assigned.
5. We will use the surplus taxes raised to create public works so that young people can have jobs. We will also support private businesses by paying 60% of wages for apprentices who are taken on, as long as they get at least 25% of their time for educational training.

Hopefully we will find other countries willing to work along similar lines. The events in the Middle East have highlighted the extreme situation of youth unemployment  in many countries. There really is very little time to bring in corrective measures; these youths can be directed to become good members of society. Remember, they have an enormous burden in years to come where they have to earn enough to support the ever-growing older generation.

We in government need to use the same tools as the demonstrators used to topple old regimes – namely the Web, social networking and mobile phones. We must show them that we can improve our communication and our ability to work speedily and securely in this new environment.

If we don’t, the young man in Scene 1 will try the other route.