"The people are not scared anymore"

Ahmad Abdel Sabour, one of the Sharqiya Tax Strike leaders, shares the same passion for photography as his Giza colleague Rizq William. Ahmad snapped some pix of the October 2007 street protests that climaxed with the victorious occupation of Hussein Higazy Street in December. The above pic was taken by him on the last day of the occupation, 13 December 2007. The strikers, lined up, were piling up the blankets they slept on for 10 days, preparing to head back home following their victory… I’ll upload in the coming few days more pix taken by Ahmad…

Sharqiya has roughly 7,000 real estate tax collectors, working in 22 local offices scattered across the eastern Nile Delta province, in addition to a main directorate in Zagazig, the provincial capital. Recalling the December 2007 occupation, Ahmad says…

Everyone (in Sharqiya) was afraid in the beginning. They were scared of their bosses and from what State Security could do. At the first day of the occupation (in downtown Cairo) I was more or less alone – I was the only one from Sharqiya. But then as time passed, and as the (Hussein Higazi St) camp stood fast, delegation after the other started coming down from the (Sharqiya) province…
The people (tax collectors in Sharqiya) are not scared anymore. In the past, they used to, but now not anymore. Everyone is happy and proud of what we did in the strike… But this is not the end…. We still have rights and promises unfulfilled. There is support for building an independent union…

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