Jean Marcou, Professor of Law at Sciences Po Grenoble, researcher at CERDAP2 and associate researcher at the French Institute of Anatolian Studies in Istanbul.

Will 2023 finally open the Grand Egyptian Museum, the new museum in Cairo Cairo, which aims to be the largest archaeological museum in the world, housing housing the world's most famous collections of Pharaonic antiquities, including including that of Tutankhamen's tomb? The immense building , which is expected to contain over 130,000 artefacts from and other museums, already stands three kilometers from the Pyramids of Giza, near Remaya Square, and a monumental statue of Ramses II has even been installed in its entrance hall since 2018. All this optimistic about a forthcoming opening, had it not been for the had it not been loudly announced several times over the last two years last two years, only to be postponed indefinitely.

However, this and, more generally, Cairo's museums are at the heart of an Egyptian at the heart of the Egyptian political regime's strategy. not only historical and touristic, but also economic and political. The aim is to boost tourism in Egypt, support the restructuring of the city of Cairo of the rapidly expanding city of Cairo, and establish the credibility of an Egyptian Egyptian revival, following the end of the revolutionary episode of the Arab Spring. ambitious program that Abdel Fattah al-Sissi's regime is struggling to implement to implement, against the backdrop of a worsening economic situation. situation.

Cairo's new large museums Cairo

This process of museum restructuring in the service of the city and, of course, politics is nothing new. The great Egyptian museum project in particular was initiated.., in 2002, at the turn of the millennium, under the presidency of Hosni Mubarak.

At a time when year after year (there will be more than 14 million tourists in million in 2010, on the eve of the January 25, 2011 revolution), the old Egyptian Museum in Museum in Tahrir Square, inaugurated in the early ^20th century, is often the old Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square. A new building was therefore needed, better able to quench the thirst for Pharaonic relics and antiquities. But the ambitious, costly and, above all, highly disrupted by political and social disrupted by the political and social events that shook Egypt in the the following decade. Despite financial support from the Japanese government government (which granted a loan of $765 million out of a total budget of 1.1 billion), the work has been slow. In 2018, the buildings, which are still damaged by fire; then came the period of the epidemic and the and several announcements of postponed inaugurations...

In 2017, to to keep impatient visitors waiting, the Egyptian authorities hastily and partially inaugurated another museum, pompously pompously named Museum of Egyptian Civilization(NMEC ). Egyptian Civilisation). The aim is to present Egyptian civilization Egyptian civilization from prehistory to the ^20th century in a single and a little noisy at peak times. The exhibition surprises, particularly in the ancient sections, but it's not without its intriguing intriguing when you reach its final developments, which symbolically symbolically dedicate the museum's final showcases to personalities who are supposed to have to have contributed to the advent of modern Egypt.

Mohammed Ali was certainly unavoidable, but he is presented here above all as a man of cotton cultivation. Khedive Ismail also has his own showcase, in this case because his memory is permanently linked to the inauguration of the Suez Canal. King Fouad, the first sovereign of the independent kingdom of Egypt, owes his presence to the founding of Cairo University during his reign. As for Talaat Harb, whose bust sits behind a model of the historic Banque Misr building Banque Misr (the first truly Egyptian bank, founded in 1920), he is there, of course, as the founder of the national economy. The absence the absence of the symbols of the struggle for Egyptian independence Mustafa Kamel, the founder of Egyptian nationalism, or even Saad Zaghloul, the hero of the first revolution (1919). But as you will have gathered, this museum museum is above all dedicated to popular techniques, lifestyles and traditions. and, in these Thermidorian times, it's best to steer clear of anything too political political or even revolutionary subjects...

Museums at the service of protean development

NMEC remained a highly uncertain undertaking until it was able to welcome 22 royal mummies from the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square in April 2021. Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square, in a parade through the streets of Cairo. This event and and the installation of the mummies of 18 kings and 4 queens in a specially the credibility of the new institution, in the same way as the Grand Egyptian Museum's spectacular arrival in its main hall in 2018. the spectacular arrival of the Colossus of Ramses II in a specially designed specially designed vehicle. These contemporary pharaonic contemporary pharaonic parades also evoke, in the collective memory, the one that Nasser organized in 1954 to install the same statue of Ramses II in front of Cairo's main railway station, before it was removed in 2006. Celebrating the second anniversary of the Free Officers' Revolution 1952, this initiative is definitely associated with a time when Nasserite Egypt Nasserite Egypt was seen as the leading nation in the Arab world and in the and non-aligned countries, to the extent that with or without the colossus has retained the name Ramses.

The creation of museums, the enhancement of emblematic sites, the relocation of statues and mummies... these events are all part of a functional, spatial and political restructuring that involves making the most of sites, monuments or collections of artifacts. In particular, this involves drawing on the heritage of other institutions: the Coptic Museum, the Al-Manyal Museum or the Museum of Islamic Art. In this case, it raises questions about the future of the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square. It was itself the result of the long history of Cairo's museums, whose ambition in the ^19th century was to showcase the heritage discovered by the first Egyptologists. Starting with Jean-François Champollion's idea of bringing this heritage together in a single place to ensure its protection, this process was to culminate in the location of the major collections in the imposing building we know today as Place Tahrir, not without having passed through several intermediate stages, notably that of the Bulaq Museum, founded by the Frenchmen Auguste Mariette and Gaston Maspero.

In fact, the the museum issue has never ceased to influence the exercise of power the exercise of power, Egypt's international relations and the very development of the city of Cairo. The Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square, opened in 1902, may be outdated, but the atmosphere of its of its dark corridors and the presence of its dusty wooden showcases, which were immortalized in the plates of two of the most famous episodes famous episodes of the Blake and Mortimer comic strip(The Mystery of the pyramid), retains a nostalgic charm that would be a shame not to not preserve. However, if this institution survives, what place will it find in the reorganization of Cairo's museums, which is also part of a complex complex reorganization of the Cairo metropolis, between the City of 6th October new Cairo, and the modernized and expanded airport? The NMEC and the Grand Museum, even if they are not neighbors, already have a place on the future on the route of the future metro line 4, which is being built by an consortium. It's true that the Egyptian Museum is already firmly established on lines 1 and 2, opposite one of the one of Cairo's most central metro stations (Sadat). So, we we can still hope that it will stay there...

Be that as it may if this movement fosters the development of a media-savvy historical effervescence and stirs the national spirit, recalling the distant times when Pharaonic times when Pharaonic Egypt dominated the world, it also leads to the mobilization of mobilize transnational players, international organizations and foreign international organizations and foreign financial backers, as it concerns an age-old heritage considered universal. All this, however, may not be enough not be enough to bring Egypt back to the forefront of the international stage, and to post-Nasserite normalization, shaken by a revolutionary crisis and partially and partially restored by a military takeover.

Egypt's economy hard hit by the Ukrainian crisis

Because the future of all these projects remains uncertain, as is that of Egypt in general. Egypt. Admittedly, the major international crisis that began in 2022 did not take place in the Middle East. the Middle East. But the Russo-Ukrainian war, for that's what it's all about war, has nonetheless had formidable consequences for a country consequences for a country that is the world's leading importer of grain largest grain importer and bread consumer in the world. As one of the speakers one of the speakers at the ^8th International Day on the Middle East held at Sciences Po Grenoble-UGA on December 6, 2022, in Egyptian Arabic bread is called "Eich", which means "life". So it's easy to see why Egyptian society is so concerned by the by the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, all the more so when we remember that remember that 70 million Egyptians (out of 105) benefit from the right to buy bread state-subsidized bread quotas. In December 2022, moreover, the National Food Institute provoked a storm of protest and anger and anger on social networks, recommending that Egyptians, for whom even for whom even frozen meat has become a luxury, not to throw not to throw away chicken pasta, and to eat this neglected part of the bird, which rich in proteins, vitamins and minerals...

In fact, the invasion of Ukraine has caused international investors to turn away from a country which has also lost most of its Russian and Ukrainian tourists. Ukrainian tourists. In the second half of 2022, Egypt therefore had no choice but to to ask the IMF for a three-billion-dollar loan of three billion dollars, to be supplemented by a further 14 billion in financing from international organizations and partners (including among others, its Gulf neighbors, who have been supporting the after the revolution). But to obtain this support, the government had to devalue the national currency by 15%. And last but not the least, on December 20, 2022, the Egyptian parliament approved a bill a bill that will allow the sale of Suez Canal Authority assets, via the through the creation of a Sovereign Wealth Fund. While opening up the capital of this public body to private investors has caused such a stir on the banks of the Nile, it's because the the nationalization of the Suez Canal by Gamal Abdel Nasser, in 1956, was seen as the ultimate act of independence for the new new Arab Republic of Egypt. Since that announcement, the pro-government since that announcement, the pro-government media have struggled to make it clear that there is no the canal, which remains the very symbol of national sovereignty. sovereignty.

There is a note of optimism in this worrying economic picture. Egypt's has the largest gas field in the Eastern Mediterranean. Known as Zohr since its discovery in 2012, it has enabled Egypt to increase gas exports to Europe, and to make them more sustainable following the following the tripartite agreement for the delivery of liquid natural gas, signed in Cairo with Israel and the European Union in June 2022. This new and welcome resource will not, however, make up for Egypt's that Egypt's debt stands at $42 billion, and that the country is now is now classified by international rating agencies as one of the world's most category of countries most at risk of defaulting on their foreign debt. external debt. In this uncertain future, Egypt's only trump card is that once again, is that nobody wants to see it collapse, and that many are ready to help it through this difficult period, whatever the cost. But it's not certain, however, that this "generosity" will go so far as to encourage accelerate the completion of current museum projects.