Activist Ahmed Douma, 4 others receive presidential pardon in latest high-profile release

Activist Ahmed Douma was photographed on Saturday embracing his father, video-calling a former prison mate, gathered with a group of newly released detainees, a former presidential candidate and an opposition party head — first moments of reunion as the activist walked free after ten years spent in prison. 

Yet “it is a joy that won't be completed until the rest of the detainees are released,” said the co-founder of the April 6 and Kefaya Movements said on Saturday.

Douma was on a list of five prisoners who were granted release by presidential amnesty on Saturday, according to a Saturday edition of the Official Gazette. 

Thirty detainees, people who had been held since 2022 in remand by the State Security Prosecution pending trial on charges of spreading false news and joining an illegal organization, were also granted release on Friday, defense lawyer Khaled Ali announced. 

Authorities have undertaken a series of expanded releases over the past year, granting amnesty to some scores of the thousands of prisoners who are held for political reasons, and terminating remand detention for dozens of suspects held on the common charge of spreading false news. 

The initiative was launched in line with the National Dialogue, a political forum launched by the president in April last year as a vehicle for promoting political inclusivity. Opposition figures invited to participate in the forum demanded the release of political prisoners as a guarantee of the dialogue's seriousness. 

Other high-profile political prisoners such as lawyer Mohamed al-Baqer and researcher Patrick George Zaki have been released in recent months.

The recent high-profile releases could be a move to conciliate public opinion and the scrutiny of international organizations monitoring human rights in Egypt, a government source told Mada Masr on condition of anonymity. “A state official had submitted recommendations to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in the past weeks advising him to ease local tension amid the ongoing economic crisis by releasing political prisoners such as Douma and Alaa Abd El Fattah,” they said. 

Douma, a prominent activist, has been imprisoned since his 2013 arrest in relation to demonstrations against the criminalization of public protests. He was sentenced to three years in prison. Before completing the sentence, he was tried in another case regarding 2011 protests held at the Cabinet headquarters, for which he ultimately received a 15-year sentence and was fined LE17 million.

During his decade in prison, Douma has penned poetry on his experiences of protest and imprisonment. He alleged multiple times while in prison that he was subjected to assault and mistreatment by the authorities and joined a number of his fellow inmates in a hunger strike against abuse and negligence by a prison official.

The four other prisoners pardoned on Saturday are Mahmoud Ali Abdel Qoddous al-Shafei, Al-Saeed Taher Mahmoud Abou al-Saud, Mohamed Dahy Abdel Rahman Mohamed and Magdy Mohamed Fathy Abou Qota.