Institutional and financing challenges for civil society organizations in Egypt
Realistic vision and recommendations
Policy Paper
Issued it
Public Policy Analysis and Human Rights Unit
Affiliate Foundation
, Maat for Peace, Development, and Human Rights
Under a project
The Universal Periodic Review as a Tool to Improve Public Policies during the Transition (Funded by the European Union)
May 2016
“This release was implemented with the help of the European Union. The content of this publication is the responsibility of the Maat Foundation for Peace, Development and Human Rights and can in no way be considered a reflection of the vision of the European Union.
Introduction:
After the January 2011 revolution, clear differences surfaced between some civil society organizations on the one hand, and some concerned state agencies on the other side, against the backdrop of mutual accusations between the two parties that reached the courts.
On the one hand, civil society organizations see that the state is exercising restrictions on it and intransigent in applying the provisions of Law 84 of 2002, which the organizations see as contrary to Egypt's international obligations and to the text of the Egyptian constitution, and on the other hand the successive governments insist that there are no restrictions on civil society while adhering to These governments have the right to legalize the status of institutions that work in fields of work that are identical to the work of civil society organizations subject to Law 84 of 2002, with the emergence of accusations of some organizations of receiving illegal funds without the approval of the regulatory authorities that are used in actions that may harm the national security of the state.
Within the framework of the Public Policy Analysis Unit at the Maat Foundation for Peace, Development and Human Rights with the recommendations that were made to Egypt in light of the UPR and the Egyptian government's position on the recommendations and in light of the Foundation’s implementation of the “Universal Periodic Review as a Tool for Improving Public Policies during the Transition Period” project, which the Foundation implements with funding From the European Union during 2016-2017 comes the paper “Institutional and financing challenges for organizations”.
The paper deals with several basic points: It begins with a quick definition of the beginnings of civil work, especially in Egypt, and then deals with the stages of its work and civil work relations with successive political systems, especially in the period after the 1952 revolution until the January 25 revolution, then we move on to discuss the structural and financing crises that the organizations suffer from and we propose In the last part of the paper are some recommendations that may contribute to solving these crises.
The beginnings of civil society and its developments
The idea of civil society emerged at the end of the eighteenth century as a result of the revolutionary transformations and political changes that took place in Europe as Europe passed to democracy after decades of bourgeois despotism. Especially since the rulers at that time considered that the stability of governance depends mainly on meeting the needs of individuals. Therefore, the idea of civil society in the Western world crystallized with the emergence and development of the modern state and its cohesion with it strongly, as civil society became the other face of the state, and with the development of stable democracies, the concept of civil society was strongly linked By preserving freedom, equality, and the general will of the state at this time.
The emergence of civil society in Egypt goes back to the year 1821 when the first civil society was established in Egypt under the name of the Greek Association in Alexandria, which was the pioneer in spreading the idea of forming civil societies, but most of them were associations specialized in various fields such as culture and research, such as the Egypt Society for Research in the History of Civilization The Egyptian Society, followed by the Knowledge Society and the Geographical Society, and in the year 1878 the first religious association which was called the Islamic Charitable Society, followed in the year 1881 by the declaration of the Coptic Charitable Endeavors Association[1].
With the beginning of the twentieth century, and especially after the approval of the 1923 Constitution, which allowed the establishment of more civil societies, due to its guarantee of many rights and freedoms, the most important of which was the freedom and right to form associations, and the authority to dissolve them should be in the hands of the judiciary only in light of Articles 54 and 80 of the Civil Code Which was given the authority to cancel decisions and dissolve associations in the hands of the judiciary, which helped in the further liberation of civil work organizations, which led to an increase in the spread of these associations in that period until 1945 AD, and perhaps there is another explanation for the spread of civil work associations and the increase in their activity during that period And that is that the state was preoccupied with war and security work, which made the civil work associations take upon themselves the other side of the state’s work, which is helping the homeless, the injured and the victims of wars, and in addition to this social role there was a cultural role for these associations, where it was concerned during that period with the identity of the Egyptian personality. Is it Islamic Arab or Pharaonic mother or Mediterranean Sea. The following table shows the development of the publicity rate of civil society organizations in Egypt and the most important features of each time period from 1925 to 2014 [2]
| The year | Notice | Number of associations |
| 1925 | After the issuance of the first official constitution recognizing associations | 300 |
| 1950 | Two years before the July Revolution | 2000 |
| 1970 | With the end of the period of Nazarene rule | 7000 |
| 1980 | With the end of Sadat’s rule and after the policy of openness was adopted | 8402 |
| 1990 | An awakening of civil society and was greatly affected by the United Nations global conferences | 12.832 |
| 2000 | Full clarity of the flow of external financing | 16.000 |
| 2011 | After the events of the January revolution | 31.000 |
| 2014 | After interactions between global and national variables | 46.200 |
The procedural concept and the legal and human rights reality for civil society organizations in Egypt
- First: the procedural concept and the legal reality
The Egyptian concept of civil society organizations limits it to the form of associations and civil institutions, where the association is legally defined as every group with a continuous organization for a certain or unspecified period consisting of natural persons of no less than ten persons or from legal persons with the aim of not obtaining a profit.
Although the law governing the work of civil organizations in Egypt is Law 84 of 2002, and the Ministry of Social Solidarity is based on its application, in few cases NGOs take the form of non-profit civil companies, and in this case they are not subject to the supervision of the Ministry of Social Solidarity. Time is not governed by the provisions of Law 84 of 2002, but rather performs the same functions as other NGOs subject to these mechanisms.
According to Article (11) of Law (84) of 2002, civil societies work to achieve their objectives in various fields of community development in accordance with the rules and procedures specified by the law and the executive regulations.
Article (11) of the law permits the association - after taking the opinion of the competent federations and the approval of the administrative authority - to operate in more than one field, as well as prohibiting the establishment of secret societies and associations that carry out activities such as forming companies or military formations or of a military nature, or threatening the unit Patriotism, violates public order or morals, or calls for discrimination between citizens on the basis of sex, origin, color, language, religion or creed.
The same article of the law also prohibits associations from practicing political activity that is limited to political parties according to the political parties law, and any union activity that is limited to trade unions in accordance with trade union laws, and it also prohibits them from targeting a profit or practicing an activity devoted to that, while the law permitted the association after its acquisition. Legal person carrying out any activity leading to the realization of its objectives in the development of society.
Article (48) of the executive regulations of Law (84) of 2002 clarified that one of the fields of community development is any activities aimed at achieving continuous human development, whether in educational, health or cultural activities, social, economic or environmental services, consumer protection or awareness. With constitutional and legal rights, social defense, human rights, and other activities.
Egypt's constitutions in the post-revolution of January 25, 2011 witnessed a qualitative development in the constitutional framework related to civil organizations. Article 75 of the 2014 constitution stipulates that “Citizens have the right to form associations and civil institutions on a democratic basis, and they shall have legal personality upon notification. They shall freely exercise their activities. Administrative authorities may not interfere in their affairs, dissolve them, or dissolve their boards of directors or their boards of trustees except with a court ruling, and it is prohibited to establish or continue civil associations or institutions whose system or activity is secret or of a military or quasi-military character, and all of this is in the manner organized by law.
This constitutional text opens the door wide for making major amendments to the current law governing the establishment, operation and dissolution of civil organizations to comply with the rules established by the constitution.
- Second: the human rights framework
First: The text of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Egypt ratified in 1982 in the first and second paragraphs of Article 22, that “
- Everyone has the right to freedom of association with others, including the right to form and join trade unions in order to protect their interests.
- No restrictions may be placed on the exercise of this right other than those stipulated by law and which constitute necessary measures, in a democratic society, for the maintenance of national security, public safety, public order, protection of public health or public morals, or protection of the rights and freedoms of others. This article does not prevent members of the armed forces and police from subjecting to legal restrictions on exercising this right.
Second: While Egypt was subject to the universal periodic review in 2014, a number of countries made some recommendations that were fully or partially approved by the Egyptian government regarding the right of civil societies and institutions to receive funds and amending the Associations and Institutions Law to comply with the constitutional articles and the recommendations came as follows:
- Promote measures necessary to implement the rights stipulated in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, including the adoption of the necessary legislation (South Africa);
- Continue to ensure that its human rights obligations are fulfilled, in particular the rights set forth in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and other human rights agreements to which it is a party (Philippines);
- Review the law on associations and the law to demonstrate in order to comply with the constitution, as well as international law, and immediately release persons detained or imprisoned for exercising their freedom of expression by participating in peaceful protests (Sweden);
- Protect freedom of assembly and association by revising the Protest Law, eliminating all forms of interference with the registration and operation of NGOs, ensuring their right to seek and receiving funding, and stop issuing final warnings to unregistered NGOs (Norway);
- Facilitating the work of civil society actors by removing excessive requirements imposed on their registration, operation and financing, and harmonization of the Associations Law with the Constitution (Czech Republic);
- Repeal the Civil Society Organizations and Associations Law (Law 84 of 2002), which limits freedom of assembly, association, and freedom of expression, or amend it to ensure that it is consistent with Egypt's international obligations (United States of America);
According to these recommendations, the Egyptian state must work quickly to legislate new laws that are in line with the constitutional articles and the voluntary international obligations for the Human Rights Council in Geneva.
Civil Society and Power: Setbacks and Breakthroughs
With the spread of the idea of civil society in Egypt and the role of the prominent person in helping the state in the aforementioned issues, its organizations and civil work have been actively subjected to multiple setbacks and breakthroughs, including: -
The first setback :
Civil society in Egypt began to suffer a major setback with the beginning of 1953 when the decision to dissolve political parties was issued by former President Gamal Abdel Nasser and the establishment of a single political organization that developed from being an editorial body and then a national union until it reached the Socialist Union. Then followed that many sizing decisions for civil society associations, where the activities of the Women's Union and the Nile Girls' Union were stopped, then the issuance of Law 348 of 1956 AD, which would impose the dissolution of all civil organizations and consider this law that any violation of its provisions is a crime subject to the Penal Code.
The breakthrough:
The death of former President Gamal Abdel Nasser and the assumption of former President Mohamed Anwar Sadat in the early 1970s was a major breakthrough for civil society, as Sadat issued two decisions among the most important decisions in the history of civil society in Egypt, namely the decision to shift towards restricted political pluralism and the policy of economic openness, as these two decisions helped to increase the number of associations. Civil work and the opening of more opportunities for these associations to obtain foreign funding, and with the beginning of the eighties, the control of political Islam currents over the various professional syndicates appeared, and the number of human rights and defense organizations in Egypt increased from the eighties until now.
The second setback:
The beginning of the era of former President Mohamed Hosni Mubarak to open new horizons for civil work in Egypt, which soon turned into hostility between the government on the one hand and civil society, especially organizations working in the field of human rights on the other hand, what invited observers to describe that period as a period of hostility between the regime and society Civil society, and then it is not clear that the work of civil society was subjected to multiple laws that led to restricting the work of organizations, and the guardianship was imposed on some unions and the dissolution of others, in addition to the emergency law that allowed the government to intervene in the affairs of civil society organizations there was a law organizing the work of civil institutions known as Law 84 For the year 2002, which delegated the granting and prevention powers to the Ministry of Social Solidarity (formerly Social Affairs), it also enabled those authorities to regulate and monitor the sources of funding for these societies. This law also prohibited civil institutions from practicing any political or union activity.
The third setback :
The revolution of the twenty-fifth of January came to give new hope and new prospects for the work of civil society in a better way in Egypt after the removal of the Mubarak regime, which at the end of its rule stalled the work of civil society in general, as civil, development and charitable societies started enjoying the freedom to start and work without restrictions and soon the work opened until Signs of a new crisis appeared between the state and the organizations against the background of Case 173, which was known in the media as the issue of "foreign funding for civil society organizations." As a result, several foreign and Egyptian human rights organizations were attacked, and all files and contents of these institutions were confiscated. An arrest warrant was issued for 43 people, including 19 Americans.
This move came against the background of the US ambassador’s announcement at the time that “Banerson” before the US Senate Foreign Affairs Committee that 65 Egyptian organizations had applied for US financial grants to support civil society and that the United States dispersed 40 million dollars within five months to civil society organizations to support democracy. in Egypt. This was confirmed by the then Minister of Planning and International Cooperation, Fayza Abul-Naga, who stated that during the 4 months from March to June 2011, civil organizations were funded with $ 175 million, while the volume of funding in 4 years from 2006 to 2010 did not exceed $ 60 million, and charges were filed for four. American organizations finance these organizations to violate Egyptian laws and engage in political, not human rights, actions to dismantle Egyptian society and stir up sedition.
This was followed by great pressure from the American side to reverse this decision, and after the Egyptian side rejected these pressures, the aid paper was pressed as a means of American pressure, which led to the deportation of the Americans and to stop the case until it was opened again recently.
The institutional and financing problems that civil society organizations suffer from in Egypt
Before developing a new civil work law, the legislator and decision-maker must have an objective view of the nature of the challenges facing Egyptian civil society organizations, which are various challenges, and the current paper focuses on institutional and financing challenges, while other papers will discuss political, legislative and other challenges, as follows: A review of these challenges: -
- First: - The internal institutional challenges
Egyptian civil society organizations suffer from “internal institutional” problems that greatly weaken their ability to influence the international level. The most important of these problems can be highlighted as follows: -
- The style of management and governance in most organizations tends to “consecrate the hegemony of one person” and the absence of the principle of rotation of power: the founders and heads of organizations that have arisen since the early 1990s and onwards are still the actual ones who dominate the decision-making process within these entities, and there are no meaningful differences between those Organizations that take a legal form that complies with the provisions of Law 84 of 2002, and those that take forms that do not comply with this law.
- Most organizations at least - far from the logic of “business administration”, as they do not invest enough in their human resources, do not constantly develop their administrative structure, and do not adopt clear and “written” visions and strategies. Therefore, what prevails in civil work is the logic of the activist It is not the "corporate entity" logic.
- Confusion between political and human rights (especially among defense and human rights organizations): Because of the political and ideological background of quite a few of the first and second generations in the Egyptian human rights movement, and because of the one-person dominance element that we previously talked about, many human rights organizations move on “political” grounds, It is not "human rights", and as a matter of realizing the truth, the years of former President Mubarak's rule and the demolition of party life that characterized them, and then the absence of serious political opposition institutions, contributed to the movement of human rights organizations to fill this void, as well as the concentration of most violations during the past three decades in The field of civil and political rights.
- Weak international presence of Egyptian organizations: Although there are a number of organizations that have a consultative status, their number is very limited, and their institutional presence in European capitals and near the headquarters of the United Nations and international missions is very limited, in addition to the severe weakness in the relationship of these organizations with Western media and groups Pressure and influence in the West
- There is a large gap between the organizational capacities of civil society organizations in rural areas versus those in urban areas. Civil society organizations in urban areas have access to qualified personnel and have opportunities to cooperate with a greater number of other organizations, while civil society organizations in rural areas do not have the same opportunities despite their large number, which exceeds 43,000 organizations registered according to Law 84 of 2002. These institutions suffer from a weakness in human capabilities and weak equipment, as well as a weakness in the multiple methods of attracting funds and depend mostly on material and in-kind donations.
- Second: financing challenges
The permanently explosive issue in this dimension is the issue of external financing, and accusing civil organizations of being a tool for external penetration because of it, and that if they were well-intentioned a means used by the West to achieve political goals and implement hidden agendas, the post-revolution period witnessed the explosion of the issue of what is known as foreign funding for organizations Al-Ahlia, which is summarized in the Egyptian government indicting a number of Egyptian and American organizations operating in Egypt with violating the law, providing and receiving funds for the purpose of achieving unlawful goals, and the Public Prosecution referred 43 accused to the judiciary on this charge, and political and strategic considerations have interfered with no small share in this case, These considerations will continue surrounding this file due to its nature. It is difficult to separate relations between states and the relationship with organizations, even if they are non-governmental. What the Egyptian-American relations have been witnessing since January 25 of the tensions and political, economic and strategic pressures on Egypt can explain the rough treatment on the part of Egyptian administration for this issue.
The problem does not lie in foreign funding per se, because most of the bodies that fund civil society organizations are themselves financing governments in implementing many projects in various fields, and the international institutions that provide grants are themselves governed by transparency frameworks and their sources of funding are officially and periodically announced. Within their own countries, the truth is that the problem lies in the security view that the state views civil work and the role of civil society as a threat to its stability. This crisis is not emerging today. Rather, it began since the passage of the Emergency Law, which made financing operations difficult, especially external financing, and it is known that the sources of funding available to organizations in general are:
- The Egyptian government: which works to finance organizations whose programs support such as those working in the field of development, health, reproductive health services and family planning, or those classified as public benefit organizations.
- Supporting private companies and Egyptian non-governmental organizations: It is logical that this support is the basis of funding, but this type faces multiple obstacles, the most important of which is legislation that does not encourage this trend of financing, which is adopted in developed countries, such as deduction from the tax base, but sometimes it prevents it. Institutions that carry out financing operations, also one of the obstacles that these bodies direct most of their funds to support humanitarian and social activities without thinking about supporting human rights activities and political awareness, for example.
- Funding based on individual donations and it is mostly based on funding for charitable projects and caring for widows, orphans and the elderly. Individual donors are interested in establishing private schools and medical monuments, and donors are not interested in funding human rights projects usually.
- Foreign funding, and Egypt is subject to strict conditions, according to Law No. 84 of 2002 organizing private work, which requires written approval from the Minister of Social Solidarity.
The availability of funding and its conditions are one of the most important determinants of the activity of civil society organizations, as the activity of the majority of these organizations depends on the existence of stable sources of funding that guarantee their survival and continuity of their activities, and this problem can be summarized in its general framework as follows:
- Conditionality of foreign funding and blockade by the state.
- The weak level of national funding and its dispersion of priorities
- Unequal access to financing sources.
These are problems that existed and are still present and are related to one degree or another to the restrictions of the authority, so that the regulations that restrict civil work, at the level of legislation and practice, cannot be envisaged to provide the conditions required to support this sector.
Foreign financing has its conditions. It is besieged by its submission to government approval. The level of national funding does not meet the needs of civil society organizations, either because of the weak culture of giving or the bias towards charitable giving alone. In addition, the legislation and laws currently in force do not provide sufficient encouragement or facilities for national donor institutions to play their role in supporting NGOs. On the other hand, realistic practices indicate the uneven opportunities of these organizations in accessing appropriate sources of funding, given the flow of grants and aid to organizations without others.
The financing of civil society organizations is the main problem as a result of the prevailing political and social conditions that Egypt is going through at this stage, especially in light of the accusations by successive governments of civil society organizations that they are working against national security. The intransigence in approving grants provided by international bodies to organizations, especially human rights, is one of the most prominent measures adopted by the regime, especially since the January revolution, in light of the openness of funding, especially to institutions affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood and institutions that work in defense, under the pretext of working for foreign bodies aiming to distort the image Egypt.
Recommendations
From the above, it becomes clear to us that there are multiple problems that Egyptian civil society suffers from at the level of the institutional structure and financing capabilities, and therefore the following recommendations may be useful in light of the ongoing debate on amending the law.
- First: The proposed legislative amendments
- Amending Article 6 of the Associations Law No. 84 of 2002 to be in line with Article 75 of the Constitution, so that the association is notified by mere notification, and it is not permissible to refuse to declare it without a court ruling.
- Adding clear definitions of the cases that necessitate the dissolution of the association in the second paragraph of Article 11 of the law, which is the definition of the meaning of threatening national unity, violating public order or morals, or calling for discrimination between citizens on the basis of sex, origin, color, language, religion or belief. Where the article left it loose, which allows the intervention of various parties in the dissolution of associations or institutions
- Amending the first paragraph of Article 17 of the law and approving the right of associations and institutions to collect donations without permission from the administrative body.
- Amending the second paragraph of Article 17 of the law to explicitly stipulate the freedom of institutions subject to it to receive external funds after notifying the administrative body within 30 days of receiving the funding. With the inclusion of the law on the right of the administrative body to object to foreign funds within 30 days of notifying institutions and societies subject to the law, and in the event that 30 days pass without notifying the institution or association of the objection, the funding becomes legitimate and the administrative body has no right to object to it.
- Amending the first article of the Decree by Law No. 128 of 2014 and explicitly stipulating the matters that fall under the name “What affects the national security and independence of the country” because these words are loose and give the authorities the right to terrorize the work of civil organizations under the pretext of compromising the national security and the country's stability.
- Creating a new article that allows the administrative body to monitor the work and aspects of spending that the institutions undertake and review them periodically.
- The introduction of banks is required to notify the Central Bank in its supervisory capacity before recording any sums transferred from abroad to the accounts of institutions and societies, and also before sending any of them abroad.
- Creating articles that criminalize the establishment of institutions or companies of any kind, offices or clinics operating within the same scope of work as institutions and societies subject to the law.
- Creating legislative articles in investment laws that motivate private sector companies to finance associations and institutions working in the field of human rights by deducting donations from the tax base.
- Creating legislative articles that limit the term of office of the Associations' Board of Directors to a period of four years and renewed only once.
- Second: procedural proposals
- The Ministries of Higher Education and Education establish a department or department concerned with the field of public and legal work and social responsibility service in schools and universities, and through them the culture of voluntary and legal work is spread.
- Civil society organizations organize workshops and lectures on volunteer work in schools for students and teachers, and define the concepts of volunteering, its implications and importance.
- Institutions work to establish internal strategic planning units to develop multiple studies, plans and scenarios to ensure the continuity of the flow of funds necessary to sustain their work
- Institutions work to invest in their human resources and continuously develop their administrative structure, while working on adopting clear and “written” visions and strategies, and periodically reviewing their institutional capabilities with the aim of developing institutions internally, which leads to the sustainability of work.
- Establishing institutions to work on their presence in international arenas and strengthening their relationship with Western media and lobbying and influence groups in the West with the aim of communicating nationally to present correct views on Egypt.
- Institutions and associations provide the correct figures and data on the association’s activities with transparency and announce it to the public opinion and the media
[2]- Dr. Amani Kandil - Shifts in Structure and Function - Civil Society After the Revolutions in Egypt Arab Center for Research and Studies
Institutional and financing challenges for civil society organizations in Egypt
Institutional and financing challenges for civil society organizations in Egypt
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