The House of Representatives' Housing Committee passed a law that empowers the Armed Forces to build on land it owns without a need for permits on Saturday.
The panel passed the 2015 amendments to a 2008 “building law” amid a brief controversy between some MPs and Assistant Defense Minister Mamdouh Shahin.
“The army does not need permission to build on its own land, but needs permission only from its own minister: The Defense Minister,” Shahin said during a committee session discussing the law.
“That law (building law) does not apply to the Armed Forces,” Shahin told interlocutors, adding that there was no need to include in the law prior approval from the country’s National Defense Council for the army to build on its own lands.
He explained that projects entrusted by the government to the Engineering Authority of the Armed Forces (EAAF) are instead the ones that require clearance from concerned government authorities.
“The EAAF is not above any institution and operates according to the law,” Shahin stated.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
