As Egypt faces an economic crisis and a decline in the value of its currency, social media pages and accounts circulated posts claiming that Finance Minister Mohamed Maait recently stated that "the pound is the second best currency" in the world. The posts included an image that appears to be taken from an electronic platform of the Egyptian newspaper "Al-Shorouk," featuring a picture of the finance minister and an accompanying comment: "Maait: The pound is the second best currency globally." These posts garnered hundreds of shares and thousands of comments on social media platforms like Facebook and X amid the current crisis.
According to a government website, the minister made this statement during a program aired on a local channel amid the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. He had said at the time, "Just before Corona, Egypt was ranked second in the world in terms of currency value improvement." Local media outlets then republished the statement on their pages, including Al-Shorouk.
However, Al-Shorouk did not publish a new statement from the minister with this meaning; what appeared on social media was a re-circulation of some pages and accounts of the old statement to suggest it was new. The newspaper denied the claims on Sunday, clarifying that the statement circulated by social media users dates back to 2021 and is not new. They also explained on their website that the statement "dates back to 2021, during the program 'Facts and Secrets' with journalist Mustafa Bakri, when Finance Minister Mohamed Maait stated that the Egyptian pound is considered the second best currency in the world in terms of improvement during 2020." Local media had previously reported a similar statement from the minister in 2019, but no media outlet has reported similar remarks from him in recent days.
