Abouel Fotouh accuses Tora prison staff of assault

The defense team of imprisoned former presidential candidate Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh is preparing to file an official complaint with the Public Prosecution accusing staff at Tora Prison Complex of physically assaulting him, according to a legal source who spoke to Mada Masr on condition of anonymity.

The report of the assault against Abouel Fotouh, 71, is just the latest in a string of assaults and mistreatment of other prominent activists and political figures imprisoned in Tora in recent days, a number of whom have launched hunger strikes in protest. 

On Saturday, Abouel Fotouh's family released a statement on his official Facebook page denouncing what they described as a “barbaric” assault he was subjected to in his prison cell on March 23 at the complex’s Tora Farm Prison, but which was only revealed to his family during their visit with him on Saturday. His family “held the current political regime, the Interior Minister, the assistant minister in charge of the Prison Authority and the warden of Tora Farm” responsible for the assault.

As a result of the assault, Abouel Fotouh, who has suffered from multiple heart attacks and other chronic health issues while in detention, had an episode of angina, according to the statement. The prison administration’s response, his family said, was to allow Abouel Fotouh to take an arterial dilator twice over a period of six hours until his condition stabilized. Abouel Fotouh has long complained of medical negligence over his years in detention, a practice that has been widely documented in Egyptian prisons by human rights groups.

The assault took place after Abouel Fotouh requested to meet the warden in order to file a complaint explaining why he has refused to receive visitors for over two months. The former presidential candidate refused to enter his cell until he met the warden, and ended up being violently forced into the cell by the Prison Authority inspector in Tora, Brigadier General Ahmed al-Wakil, and another officer named Ashraf Shalaby, in addition to a force of soldiers, the statement said.

The news of the assault on Abouel Fotouh came after detained activist Ahmed Douma, researcher Ahmed Samir Santawy, and journalist Hisham Fouad entered a hunger strike in recent days to protest the conditions of their imprisonment at Tora. Douma’s brother had told Mada Masr that one of the officers accused of assaulting Abouel Fotouh, Ahmed al-Wakil, had also assaulted both Douma and Santawy in recent days. 

In the following days, Abouel Fotouh was not permitted to meet the prison warden or the prison’s investigation officer to file a report on the assault either, the statement added.

Abouel Fotouh began refusing to receive visitors on January 29 to protest his “exceptional” prison conditions that began in early 2019 when “several restrictions were imposed on him without justification,” according to the statement.

The legal source, who is close to his defense team, told Mada Masr that Abouel Fotouh was forced to receive visits from behind a glass barrier using a telephone. While it is within the remit of the prison administration to arrange visits, the source said that placing such restrictions on Abouel Fotouh’s visits constitutes a form of arbitrary punishment.

Abouel Fotouh, the chair of the Strong Egypt Party, was arrested in February 2018 alongside the party’s deputy head Mohamed al-Qassas. They were held in remand detention for over three years before being referred to trial in August 2021 before an emergency state security court. Abouel Fotouh faces charges of “leading a terrorist group,” while the other defendants are being tried for “belonging to a terrorist group.

The latest prisoner at Tora to start a hunger strike was former MP Zyad Elelaimy, who joined the others last Monday, his mother Ikram Youssef announced in a Facebook post on Sunday. But on Wednesday, Elelaimy began to abstain from drinking water as well, after which authorities transferred him to Tora Reception Prison to receive medical care. She added that he decided to end the strike on Sunday after sunset upon reaching a “satisfactory settlement” with the prison administration.