WATANI International
11 September 2011
Last month saw the arrest of 15 Egyptian fisherman on a fishing boat that had strayed into Libyan territorial waters off the Mediterranean coast at Misrata. The fishermen called home to say they were treated abominably by the Libyan revolutionary authorities and thrown into prison. One month earlier, 15 fishermen on two other Egyptian fishing boats from the same village were held off the Tunisian port of Sfax, and are detained pending court trial.
The incidents are nothing new. They come at the end of a long trail of similar incidents of Burg Mgheizal fishermen straying into international territorial waters. But prior to the revolutions sweeping the Arab World, diplomatic and political contacts with Libyan and other authorities used to secure the release of the fishermen and spare them trials once the Egyptian government paid the required fine.
The predicament of Burg Mgheizal
The town of Burg Mgheizel lies in the Nile Delta to the east of Rashid (Rosetta) and 150 kilometres from the regional capital of Kafr al-Sheikh. Most of the local residents depend on fishing for their livelihood. As remote as it may be, Burg al-Mgheizel is famous for its shipbuilding yards where seven workshops manufacture wooden or steel fishing and pleasure boats. These boatyards employ about 200 workers and export their product to Saudi Arabia, Libya, Syria and Malta.
The town appears prosperous, but the lives of the residents are nothing short of a sample of agony. Most live in poverty and lack basic needs. Many fishermen lose their life in storms while out at sea, while others are lost at sea. Some find themselves arrested by the Libyan or Tunisian authorities after straying into their regional waters in violation of international law, often accidentally swept off course by treacherous currents.
The Burg Mgheizal fishermen have to sail into distant waters, frequently trespassing into neighbouring national waters, because of the scarcity of fish in Egyptian waters. The scarcity is mainly the result of overfishing and the harvesting of fish fry by owners of fish farms.
Statistics indicate that 68 boats were detained by Libyan authorities over the past five years.
“Owners of big fish farms harvest fish fry, leaving the fishermen with no alternative but to sail into distant waters,” Ahmed Nassar, head of the association of serving fishermen in Burg Mgheizel told Watani. He criticised the Fish Wealth Authority (FWA) for adopting inefficient policies and allowing owners of fish farms to fish off- season and monopolise fish fry. Mr Nassar called for banning fry-fishing during the breeding season from 15 June to 15 August. He says fishing is now banned from 1 May to 1 June, which serves the interests of fish farms owners. Furthermore, he explains, fishermen seek the help of their sons, and thus many children drop out from primary school. The illiteracy rate is notably high in Burg Mgheizel.
Like father like son
Fisherman Mohamed Saad Ali, 45, says that many fishermen do not send their sons to school, preferring to teach them fishing for a livlihood. “Our sons should learn how to deal with the hardships of life,” he says. “They should adapt to our way of life.
“If I send my son to school,” Mr Ali says, “he will ultimately get a college certificate but will probably not be able to find work. We have here many young men with university degrees who spend their days at cafés while their parents feel sorry for them. Nobody has the right to hold us accountable for not sending our sons to school when they leave us with no other alternative,” he insists.
Mohamed Hassan, 11, began to learn fishing when he was seven. “My father is an old man and I have one brother, so we have to work to support the family,” he says. “Going to school doesn’t help. I would rather work than see my father begging so as to buy the medication he needs. When I get to be 13 or 15, I will join one of the fishing boats. Although they have taught us never to trust the sea, I will not fear it because this is the only profession we know, and this is the profession of our forefathers.”
Ahmed el-Shamy, 55, blames the State for not providing fishermen with the support they need. As for the FWA, he says it has ruined their lives since it allows the use of internationally-banned fancy yarns which collect even very small fish and destroy the fish wealth in Egyptian waters.
Hazardous waters
“The scarcity of fish in our waters and the adverse fishing conditions drive many Egyptian fishermen to sail to Libyan, Tunisian and Maltese waters,” Mr Shamy told Watani. “More that 3500 Burg Mgheizel fishermen have travelled to Libya and Tunisia to work on boats. Out of these, around 50 to 70 die every year, and this is why the village has so many widows. The other source of suffering is the ‘fry-fish bandits who harvest fry fish and sell them to owners of fish farms. FWA officials turn a blind eye to this illegal practice. In the end, we are the victims.”
Hamouda Fahmy, Burg Mgheizel’s ‘sheikh of fishermen’ is calling upon Egyptian diplomacy to reach an agreement with the Libyan authorities to legalise the activity of Egyptian boats there. “Otherwise, Egyptian boats will face the constant threat of detainment and even deliberate dumping,” he says.
“Earlier this year,” Mr Fahmy says, “Libyan coastguards chased a boat owned by Haj Ramadan Mutawwakel for 10 hours before deliberately dumping it. They detained two other boats with 70 fishermen on board, including four children.
“The government should prevent fishing for two years in a five-mile-long area off the coast, so that fry fish can grow once more,” he says.
Yet not a few Egyptian officials criticise the fishermen for violating international law by entering other countries’ regional waters. “They promise to abide by the rules, but they never do, and the Egyptian government has to pay fines for the Libyan government to release them. They justify this attitude by saying that Egyptian waters suffer from scarcity of fish, but this does not make their behaviour any more lawful.”