A strike is looming at the Egypt’s operations of National Société Générale Bank (NSGB), with employees threatening to embark on an intensive labour action, Egypt’s Daily News reported this week.
Egypt has been engulfed by continued rolling mass action since shortly after President Mohamed Morsi wanted to give himself more executive powers late last year.
The current strike threat came after the Egyptian Financial Supervisory Authority (EFSA) approved a mandatory tender offer made by Qatar National Bank (QNB) to acquire 100 percent of NSGB, Société Générale’s Egypt operation, instead of the originally planned 77.17 percent stake, according to the Egypt’s Daily News.
QNB made the request to acquire 100 percent in Egypt’s Central Bank and this was accepted last Thursday by EFSA.
“QNB will buy 100 percent of the shares at EGP 38.65 per share,” EFSA said in a statement. QNB has offered this price compared with Sunday’s EGP 37.52, the Daily News reported.
Head of General Syndicate for Workers at Banks, Gamal Abdel Nasser, was quoted as saying the workers would stage a protest before the bank’s head office.
EFSA reportedly admitted to Reuters that it had asked QNB to propose an offer for 100 percent of NSGB. Last December, QNB said it would acquire a 77 percent stake in the bank.
Meanwhile, workers from all Orascom companies are set to stage a march today from the Nile City Towers building to the High Court Building in Downtown Cairo,
Egypt’s only independent English newspaper reported.
The march is in protest of the current travel ban placed on the current CEO of Orascom Construction Industries (OCI), Nassef Sawiris and his father, the former CEO of OCI, Onsi Sawiris.
The travel ban was placed on the Sawiris by the country’s prosecutor general.
The state-run MENA said the bans follow tax-dodging allegations, involving about EGP 4.7 billion gained from the sale of an OCI subsidiary to French firm Lafarge.
But some strikers said these allegations were politically motivated to disgrace the Sawiris family and their investments in the North African country.
