Khaled Youssef, a member of the Egyptian parliament and a prominent film director, said the government is “interfering in the content of drama” and had pushed out private production firms to exert control.
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One producer said the authorities have blocked him from working in TV or cinema, without giving a reason. Prime time talk show hosts who don’t fully toe the government line are fired or side-lined. Programme makers say the dramas they make have become bland like an insipid soup. Two of its four board members have links to Egyptian General Intelligence, and one of the company’s units was previously headed by the intelligence chief, Reuters found.Īctors critical of the government say they fear arrest. United Group has enthusiastically enforced government censorship rules.Ī dozen industry and government sources told Reuters that United Group for Media Services was set up by the state. Since 2017, a new firm called United Group for Media Services has taken control of news outlets, TV production companies and channels - in all, at least 14 so far - giving it unrivalled influence over the TV schedule. The government is also getting deeper into the entertainment business itself. Gamal el Adl’s firm, one of Egypt’s most successful TV production companies, halted work on two shows that were due to screen this year. The government has also created two WhatsApp groups that instruct news media what to report, and has placed censors at TV stations to oversee output. They include the withholding of filming permits and a list of banned topics for soaps that programme makers must agree to. Many details of the new methods are reported here for the first time.
In interviews, programme makers, and news media executives described how the Sisi administration has clamped down with controls that they say are stricter than those that existed under Hosni Mubarak, who ruled Egypt with a hard grip until being overthrown in 2011. And it is being pursued with innovative techniques. It is President Sisi’s vision – one of heroism and patriotic virtue. “There was just one entity, one eye, one taste, one vision.” He couldn’t operate in this environment, he said. He immediately halted work on the two soaps he was filming, fearing he too would run into trouble for not having a permit. But when he heard that police had raided the film set of a rival early this year because it lacked a necessary permit, he revised his view. REUTERS/Al Youm Al Saabi NewspaperĮl Adl says he thought he could manage by steering clear of the biggest taboos. President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, above, has clamped down on TV news and entertainment and a state-owned firm has been buying up networks and programme makers.
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