Mursi son withdraws application for state job

PanARMENIAN.Net - One of Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi’s sons said he was withdrawing his application for a job with a state-run company, amid a lawsuit and allegations he would secure the post because of his father’s job, Bloomberg reports.

Omar Mursi, a recent graduate of Zagazig University’s Faculty of Commerce, said he decided not to complete the application with the Egypt Airports and Air Navigation Holding Company and stressed on his Facebook page that the question remaining is “how can I get a job in my beloved Egypt?”

The younger Mursi also struck back at claims that his salary was to be thousands of dollars, saying it paid 900 Egyptian pounds ($134) per month, not 27,000 pounds as some had alleged.

The issue sounded a sour note among many young Egyptians who struggle to find work for years after graduation and argue little has changed since Hosni Mubarak’s regime in terms of the need for high-level contacts to secure state jobs. The country’s unemployment rate climbed to 13 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012 versus 12.4 percent a year earlier, government data show.

Activist groups had criticized the apparent intent to offer him a job, a move defended days earlier by the civil aviation minister, who argued the younger Mursi was qualified for the job and had gone through all the necessary tests and passed.