Current events in Egypt have caused some foreign companies to refrain from investing in Egypt, while other communication centers have sustained heavy losses after work was suspended, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology has said.
Minister of Communications Tareq Kamel said he will hold an urgent meeting with the heads of call centers on Monday to assess the scale of losses which, he added, will be announced with transparency.
These companies largely depend on the internet to provide their services and were also badly affected by the curfew imposed in Cairo and other cities.
“It seems like Egypt will be facing a major problem in attracting foreign investment in this sector,” Kamel said. “There is a need to restore confidence in the investment atmosphere in Egypt.”
The ministry will restructure its plans and rearrange its priorities, he added. There is an urgent need to restore basic services, such as communications and the Internet, especially as more than eight telephone exchange centers were burned down and their hook-ups stolen.
According to Kamel, the suspension of communication services in Egypt over the past days has led to losses estimated at US$90 billion.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
