“This revolution was calling for a unified target and no one came out to say that he was responsible for this historic outbreak”
Sawy Culture Wheel opened the mic for new ideas to flow, where the audience decided to brainstorm together bringing new initiatives to the table. Mohamed El Sawy, founder of Al Sawy Culture Wheel spoke to us about his life after the revolution, what he can do as an Egyptian citizen and what he expects from the Post-Revolution Era in terms of the rise of culture in Egypt.
Tell us your feedback about the new initiatives people are suggesting?
I’m so glad that people have lots of new ideas and initiatives and that’s a good start to a new opinionated society that enjoys freedom of speech. No one has a better citizenship than the other; everyone is at the same level of citizenship. In this conference, some people had the freedom to say that we should honor Mubarak and a man from the National Party came out to speak without getting hit by audience chairs. It’s the freedom that we will start enjoying. One suggested that we should call Egyptians abroad to come and invest in this new Egypt that has great potential. Egyptians abroad are claimed to be cut out from our society which results in cutting out their nostalgia for their homeland.
Tell us about your life after the revolution, what are your feelings?
I feel that I’m in heaven, that there is a new birth of a whole new era. If it wasn’t for the sacred Georgian Calendar, I would’ve suggested a new calendar starting from 25th of January or 11th of February. I want to feel that I’m being treated like the guy whose job it is to clean the streets, equality is the priority, and everyone should be equal in our new Egypt.
How do you evaluate the revolution? Are you 100 % satisfied with it?
What I can say is that it’s a revolution of its own; we haven’t seen anything like this throughout the history of mankind. It’s ranked as the number one in world history, everyone is impressed, and they want to teach it in history books today. This revolution was calling for a unified target and no one came out to say that he was responsible for this historic outbreak. It was done in peace and it’s an honor.
What will be the role of the media in the upcoming time?
The media has a very important role. Media should highlight the results of the revolution and should also shed light on the human value which means that people should be valued as humans.
What are your expectations for the cultural rise after the revolution?
I think that religious freedom is a very important thing and people shouldn’t categorize each other by religious views, but by actions. As Egyptians, we have an amazing ability of invention as we have very creative features; we’ve always missed out on joining in the development of human race and we should do it now.
What are your expectations from the new Ministry of Culture?
I hope that the Ministry of Culture would be focusing on the ordinary Egyptian citizen who is the horizontal base of the society and not only focus on the cream of the crop. It’s very important to focus on the opera. It’s also a vital thing to boost the cultural background of the Egyptian villager as if we take him into consideration, he’ll feel that he’s part of this society and he’ll collaborate in its development.
Note: this interview has been conducted before Mohamed El Sawy got appointed Minister of Culture for two weeks until PM Shafik resigned.
