Egypt’s media figures speak out against Mursi

“We can’t be threatened” is an expression often repeated these days among Egypt’s journalists and media professionals following a recent speech by President Mohammed Mursi in which he said: “We know who says what and for what purpose.”

The president was referring to his critics in the media industry in this statement which was widely perceived as a threat, according to media professionals.

Egyptian journalist Ibrahim Issa criticized Mursi’s speech saying that whenever the president talks about journalists, he sounds like he is espousing conspiracy theories.

“Dr. Mursi and his group believe that journalists are conspirators because the Brotherhood can only think about conspiracies.”
Issa added that “there is a severe obsession with conspiracies in the Muslim Brotherhood’s speeches, particularly when Dr. Mursi improvises his speech.”

TV host Amr Adib stated that the president’s statements represent “an official and obvious threat,” to the media industry.
He further suggests that the Brotherhood will retaliate against journalists and the media one they have shifted their focus from Egypt’s judiciary.

For his part, Egyptian TV host Mahmoud Saad strongly criticized Mursi’s statements, which were perceived by many in the media to be threatening.

Saad said that if the Brotherhood does not like what the media is stating, it can simply disregard it.

Youssef al-Husseini, another TV personality in Egypt, wondered if “there is a sanction” for what he described as “insulting the ‘Mursi’ state."