The Washington Post - 13.03.2020

A6 eZ re the washington post.friday, march 13 , 2020

last month by a Valentine’s Day

concert. A popular mahraganat

duo — Hassan Shakosh and

Omar Kamal — were performing

their catchy song “Bent El Ger-

an,” or “The neighbor’s girl” in

Arabic, whose lyrics include the

line, “If you b reak up with me ... I

drink alcohol and smoke hash-

ish.”

That prompted the nation’s

musicians syndicate, which is

aligned with the government, to

outlaw mahraganat music. The

group’s head, Hany Shaker, pub-

licly declared that such lyrics

were “promiscuous and immor-

al” and therefore prohibited. He

blamed mahraganat singers for

the “moral decline” of the coun-

try’s arts and music scene.

Mansour Hendy, an official at

the syndicate, said it had sent

requests to YouTube and Sound-

Cloud to pull down mahraganat

videos, adding that “all the con-

cerned authorities support the

decision.”

“We are trying to preserve the

traditions and values of a whole

nation,” said Hendy. “We are not

fighting against art. We are fight-

ing against this decadence.”

T he ban has evoked mixed

reactions. On a recent day, a

group of artists and singers were

chatting at the musicians syndi-

cate in downtown Cairo. On the

walls were black and white pho-

tos of Egypt’s most well-known

artists from the 1950s and 1960s,

including Umm Kulthum. Soon,

the conversation turned to mah-

raganat music.

“Mahraganat can never be

compared to classical,” said one

musician. “Music is meant to

soothe your soul. This music

makes your teeth crack.”

“Bika is a pillar of Egyptian

music,” another a rtist interjected

with a laugh, eliciting grimaces

and scorn around the room.

Two days later, the debate was

repeated inside a cafe in Al-De-

keela, where young men sipped

coffee and smoked hookahs.

Mohammad Ibrahim, a 23-

year-old fan of Bika’s, jumped to

his defense. “Everyone my age

likes these songs,” he said. “They

speak about our neighborhood,

our people. This is our culture. It

represents us. They speak about

the young people who cannot

find jobs, about our living stan-

dards. The lyrics are true. I

myself cannot find a job.”

Mahraganat singers say they

are being targeted because they

have become too popular and

wealthy.

“A lot of other superstars don’t

want their lights to get dimmed

by us,” said Bika. “They see our

numbers on You Tube and they

are scared.”

As of last week, Bika’s video

and songs were still available on

YouTube and SoundCloud. And

up until last month, he was still

able to perform at weddings. But

then, the syndicate filed a com-

plaint against him for singing at

a friend’s wedding in Alexandria.

“I sang one song for the bride

because I know her father, and

they filed a report against me,”

said Bika.

For now, he’s thinking about

his concerts next month in New

Jersey and Florida, his first trip

to America. “I am praying I get

my U.S. visa. I have a lot of fans

there,” Bika said.

“But I will perform in Egypt

again one day,” he added with a

smile.

[email protected]

heba farouk mahfouz contributed to

this report.

faced by impoverished Egyp-

tians. One track speaks of how

people were desperate for money

to buy credit for t heir cellphones.

Another is about a man who

went abroad to earn enough

money t o marry his true love. B ut

when he returned, she had mar-

ried someone else.

Few, if any, mahraganat musi-

cians write explicitly anti-gov-

ernment songs, but the themes o f

economic and social p roblems do

not reflect positively on the re-

gime.

The recent ban was triggered

omy, high unemployment and

other woes. In home studios,

often based in slums, the music

was made inexpensively on com-

puters.

Some segments of society con-

sidered it vulgar. On many radio

stations, mahraganat was denied

airtime. Instead, its popularity

grew through word of mouth,

weddings and, eventually, on-

line.

It was the lyrics that made

mahraganat ultimately go viral

on sites like YouTube. The songs

detailed the everyday pressures

feelings, of people suffering ev-

eryday life in Egypt.”

To day, he drives an orange

Audi. During the interview, eight

people walked up and asked to

take a selfie with him.

Mahraganat music, fast and

loud, soared in popularity fol-

lowing Egypt’s 2011 Arab Spring

revolts, which toppled the coun-

try’s longtime autocratic leader

Hosni Mubarak, who died last

month. The music provided an

outlet for poor Egyptians frus-

trated by political turmoil, grow-

ing repression, a declining econ-

streets. He has been a butcher, a

taxi driver and a fruit seller. But

his true passion was singing.

I n 2010, he became enchanted

by a new form of music rising o ut

of the slums. It was first concoct-

ed by disc jockeys at weddings

who began mixing folk music,

known as shaabi, with electronic

dance tunes fused with reggae,

rap and hip-hop.

“We are telling what’s going

on in the streets, the reality of

our lives,” said Bika. “These are

simple songs that are made

cheaply but they express our own

BY SUDARSAN RAGHAVAN

ALEXANDRIA, Egypt — Hamo
Bika rose up from the slums of
this northern coastal city to be-
come one of Egypt’s most popu-
lar musicians. He has amassed
millions of followers on YouTube
and SoundCloud. He has played
concerts across the Arab world.
Next month, he is scheduled to
perform in New Jersey and Flori-
da.
Bika, though, cannot perform
in his own country.
Egypt’s authorities have
banned his shows and outlawed
his music — and those of every
musician who performs the vi-
brant blend of folk and electron-
ic dance music known as mahra-
ganat, which translates as “festi-
vals” in Arabic. Since February,
clubs, hotels, music venues and
even Nile cruise boats have been
ordered not to book mahraganat
musicians, unless they want to
face stiff fines and be taken to
court.
“I had a big concert and
45,000 fans showed up. The
authorities g ot scared,” s aid Bika,
a tall, stocky 31-year-old who
favors skinny jeans, pricey
sneakers and who wore two gold
rings on his left hand.
In a nation that p rides itself o n
producing some of the most
famous Arabic singers, mostly
notably the sultry songstress
Umm Kulthum, authorities
claim mahraganat music is con-
tributing to Egypt’s “moral de-
cline.” The lyrics, they say, pro-
mote drugs, violence and pro-
miscuity. Last month, the
spokesman for Egypt’s parlia-
ment declared that the nation
was in a war over its cultural
identity.
“Egypt used to export art to
the Arab world, but now some-
one takes off his clothes onstage
and sings about being the best,”
Salah Hasaballah, the spokes-
man, told a prominent television
host on his show. “If we fear a
virus called corona ... then this
virus, that is falsely classified as
art, is even more dangerous to
Egypt than corona.”
The ban is the l atest chapter i n
an ongoing battle for the c ultural
soul of Egypt and the image it
presents to the world. It is also
an indicator of how censorship
and assaults on the freedom of
speech and expression are reach-
ing new heights under President
Abdel Fatah al-Sissi.
Belly dancers and actresses
have been sued for immoral
behavior or for wearing gauze
dresses. Poets and writers have
been sentenced to prison over
Facebook posts deemed blasphe-
mous. Soap operas have been
ordered to omit scenes consid-
ered immoral or political and to
depict police and other security
figures in a positive manner.
Under Sissi’s government, le-
gal protections for artistic ex-
pression are routinely over-
looked.
“It worries any repressive re-
gime that such singers are be-
coming more famous as time
goes by,” s aid Mahmoud Othman,
who runs Freedom of Thought
and Expression, a Cairo-based
law firm that works on free
speech issues. “Because it means
that at some point they might
express themselves politically.”
Bika grew u p in t he Al-Dekeela
neighborhood, a bustling warren
of darkly lit alleyways and crum-
bling buildings in the northern
Egyptian city of Alexandria. He
never went to school, and swiftly
learned how to find work on the

The World

geRMANY

Wing of far-right AfD

i s deemed ‘extremist’

German authorities are
formally placing a part of the far-
right Alternative for Germany
party u nder surveillance after
classifying it as extremist, the
domestic intelligence agency said
Thursday.
Thomas Haldenwang, the head
of the intelligence agency BfV, said
that after more than a year of
examination, his office has
concluded that a radical faction
within Alternative for Germany
known as “the Wing” meets the
definition of a “right-wing
extremist movement.”
Alternative for Germany, o r
AfD, criticized the move, which
allows authorities to use covert
methods to observe the Wing and
its estimated 7,000 supporters.
They m ake up about 20 percent of

the AfD’s overall membership but

hold significant sway over its

direction, according to former

party m embers.

The Wing is led by the AfD’s

regional chiefs in the eastern

states of Thuringia and

Brandenburg, Bjoern Hoecke and

Andreas Kalbitz.

Haldenwang described Hoecke

and Kalbitz as “right-wing

extremists,” noting Hoecke’s

historical revisionism, his anti-

Islamic and anti-immigrant

rhetoric, and his close ties to

extremists outside of the party.

“We mustn’t j ust keep an eye on

violent extremists but also watch

those who use words to spark

fires,” s aid Haldenwang, adding

that anti-Semitism, hatred of

Islam and racism spread online or

in political arenas p rovide the

“breeding ground” f or violence.

Germany has been shaken by

far-right killings in the past year.

— Associated Press

MYANMAR

Remains of suspected

WWII dead sent to U.S.

The U.S. military on Thursday

repatriated what may be the

remains of service personnel who

were lost in action in Myanmar

during World War II.

The remains from Myanmar’s

central Sagaing r egion were

recovered in a mission carried out

by the Defense POW/MIA

Accounting Agency of the U.S.

Defense Department, the U.S.

Embassy said.

The remains will be flown to

the agency’s laboratory in Hawaii

for analysis and potential

identification.

There are 505 U.S. service

members still unaccounted in

Myanmar, which was known as

Burma during World War II. The

remains of 23 have been identified

after three recovery missions

carried out in 2003 and 2004 and

nine since 2013.

The remains repatriated

Thursday are thought to be

related to a B-25G bomber with a

crew of seven that was lost in

February 1944. Myanmar was

then a British colony occupied by

Japan’s a rmed forces.

The plane’s w reckage was

located in 1946, and some possible

remains were recovered last year

in the same region but have not

yet yielded an identification.

According to the Defense POW/

MIA Accounting Agency, m ore

than 72,000 Americans in all

remain unaccounted for from

World War II, more than 7,

from the Korean War and 1,

from the conflict in Vietnam.

— Associated Press

Pakistani anti-graft body arrests

media mogul: Pakistan’s a nti-

corruption body ordered t he

arrest of the o wner and editor i n

chief of Pakistan’s l argest

independent group of newspapers

and TV s tations in a decades-old

case related to allegations of tax

evasion in a real estate purchase.

Mir Shakilur Rehman’s Jang

Group o f Newspapers, w hich

includes Geo TV, has been critical

of the government. Rehman’s

arrest drew condemnation from

the country’s journalism

community, w ith Geo News

calling the arrest “political

victimization.” The arrest comes

amid increasing pressure on

journalists in Pakistan by state

institutions and security agencies.

Turkey blames Kurdish fighters

for deadly blast in Syria: A car

bombing at a checkpoint manned

by Turkish-backed opposition

fighters in northeastern Syria

killed at l east four people, local

officials and Syrian opposition

activists said. The office of the

governor of Turkey’s s outhern

Sanliurfa region said one

gendarmerie corporal and three

local s ecurity p ersonnel were

killed. It b lamed Kurdish

militants for the blast. Ankara

views the Kurdish fighters as

terrorists for their links to a

Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey.

5 killed in thunderstorms in

Egypt: Thunderstorms packing

heavy rains and lightning caused

widespread flooding across E gypt,

killing at l east five people and

injuring five, o fficials said.

Authorities closed s chools,

government offices and Luxor

International Airport, a key hub

for tourists. Three seaports — the

Mediterranean port of Alexandria

and the Red Sea ports of Sharm el-

Sheikh and Hurghada — also were

closed, and several key highways

were shut down. Railway

authorities suspended train

service nationwide.

— From news services

Digest

In Egypt, a vibrant brand of street music is silenced

As the government fights for control of the nation’s cultural identity, Hamo Bika and other mahraganat musicians find their artistic avenues outlawed

Photos by sima Diab for the Washington Post

TOP: Hamo Bika’s manager, who goes by Dolsika, 21, speaks on the phone with clients inside the mahraganat musician’s recording studio

in Alexandria, Egypt. ABOVE: The studio is adorned with posters from Bika’s past shows. The popular singer has played concerts across

the Arab world, but authorities recently banned him from performing in Egypt, calling his style of music “promiscuous and immoral.”

UPLOADED BY "What's News" vk.com/wsnws TELEGRAM: t.me/whatsnws