In a statement, Amnesty International denounced Mr. Geneina’s trial and sentencing as “another example of the shameless silencing of anyone who is critical of the Egyptian authorities.”
Nathan Brown, an Egypt scholar at George Washington University, said in an email that the issue might not be “criticism per se, but the threat to provide information that would be highly embarrassing to the military as an institution and to el-Sisi personally.”
“He is not merely being discredited; he is being muzzled and punished,” Mr. Brown said of Mr. Geneina.
During the election campaign, Mr. Sisi’s supporters made a concerted effort to mobilize voters — using incentives like free groceries and small cash payments — widely taken as a sign of the president’s desire for a strong mandate to usher in constitutional changes that could extend his term in office.
There has been little talk of such changes since then, but Egyptian officials have signaled they intend to continue with an uncompromising approach that brooks little dissent.
Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh, a moderate Islamist who ran in the 2012 presidential contest, continues to be detained, a sign of how little space exists for opposition voices.
On Monday, the Foreign Ministry denounced the decision by Unesco, the United Nations cultural organization, to award its annual press freedom prize to Mahmoud Abou Zeid, a photojournalist also known as Shawkan who has been detained without charge for four and a half years.
A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Ahmed Abu Zeid, accused Unesco of “disregard for the rule of law” in bestowing the award on a prisoner. Human rights groups say the journalist is typical of thousands of Egyptians held for months, often years, without trial in brimming prisons.
More recent investigations targeting journalists have further chilled free speech.
Last week, the former editor in chief of Al Masry Al Youm, one of Egypt’s most widely read newspapers, was released on bail. He is being investigated along with eight journalists at the paper for a headline in their election coverage.
The case was instigated by Samir Sabry, a private lawyer who has brought numerous cases against Mr. Sisi’s critics in the news media. Separately, the editor in chief of a website that translated a New York Times article on the election remains in custody.
Mr. Geneina, a former judge, headed Egypt’s Central Auditing Organization until he was fired by Mr. Sisi in 2016 after he estimated that official graft had cost Egypt $76 billion over a three-year period.
After signing up for Mr. Anan’s short-lived election campaign in January, Mr. Geneina was badly beaten outside his home by men he described as government thugs. The police said the men had gotten into a fight with Mr. Geneina over a traffic accident.
Mr. Geneina’s lawyers say they will appeal the five-year sentence. “This is what happens to all those who choose the path of justice and struggle,” one said in a Facebook post.
Source : Nytimes
