Egypt: widespread protests over water shortages

Egyptians without clean water during the summer months have begun mass demonstrations, various media reports from Cairo and rural area said in recent weeks. Protesters demand that the government intervene to end their critical shortages. Since July's mass protests began, the demonstrations have spread to other parched Egyptian towns and villages. In one case, the town of Manial El Roda was billed for one month's water, even though they had not received any during that period.

"While the Egyptian media focuses on water shortages in Al-Daqahliya and Kafr Al-Sheikh in the northern Nile Delta region, southern rural areas are -- as always -- forgotten," says Mustafa Mohsen Mohamed Taha, mayor of Al-Qodaby, a small village in the Upper Egypt governorate of Beni-Sweif. "In Al-Qodaby we have suffered from insufficient water supplies for 20 years. It all started when a rich landowner-turned-politician used his position to divert one of Kishn's main irrigation canals to increase the water supply to his own property," says Taha.