Hisham Talaat Mustafa

Hisham Talaat Mustafa ( Arabic هشام طلعت مصطفى, DMG Hišām Ṭalʿat Muṣṭafā ; English transcription Hisham Talaat Moustafa ; * 1959 ) is an Egyptian real estate entrepreneur and politician. From 2008 to 2010 he was at the center of a high-profile murder trial in Cairo.

biography

Mustafa is the son of a building contractor and from 1976 studied first civil engineering, then at the request of his father business administration (at that time still accounting) with a degree in 1980. He then took over in the family business (which also included two older brothers who were trained as civil engineers) financial side and later the management. The company experienced a particular boom in 1986/87 with building projects in the seaside resort of Agami near Alexandria and in northern Egypt. They were the first construction company in Egypt to build their own district for the wealthy, Al-Rehab, a suburb of Cairo.

Today he is co-owner of the listed Talaat Mustafa Group (TMG), one of the largest Egyptian companies with over 10,000 employees in 23 individual companies, which is active in the real estate and tourism business as well as in agriculture. It is 49% owned by foreign (mainly Arab) investors such as al-Walid ibn Talal .

The company includes the “ Four Seasons ” hotel chain in Egypt, the “ San Stefano Gran Plaza ” complex in Alexandria and extensive holiday resorts in Egypt, including in Sharm El Sheikh . Today the company is run by Mustafa's eldest son, Tarek Talaat Mustafa. Mustafa's net worth was estimated at $ 800 million in 2007. Mustafa was considered a friend of the son of Hosni Mubarak , Gamal Mubarak , and was himself in the Egyptian Senate (Shura Council) as a member of the ruling National Democratic Party .

Mustafa is married to several women and has three children.

Suzan Tamim murder trial

On July 28, 2008, the Lebanese pop singer Suzan Tamim (1977–2008) , who is very well known in the Arab world, was murdered with numerous knife wounds in her luxury apartment in Dubai. Her throat was cut and her face was disfigured. Soon the suspicion fell on Mustafa, who wanted to marry Tamim, who had already been divorced twice, but was turned down by her in favor of an Iraqi kick boxer. He was arrested in September 2008. After a high-profile trial from November 2008, he was sentenced to death by a court in Cairo on May 21, 2009, as was Mohsen al-Sukkari, a former police officer and bodyguard of Mustafa, who was hired by him for two million dollars . Previously, in Egypt, public coverage of the trial had been banned and the public had been excluded from the trial. The verdict came as a surprise, as the restrictions on reporting and Mustafa's background indicated high levels of political protection. The evidence, however, was overwhelming. The Egyptian secret service had wiretapped calls between al-Sukkari and Mustafa in which they discussed the murder of the singer. A surveillance camera showed al-Sukkari entering and leaving the singer's apartment and a bloody shoe print of the perpetrator was found. The authorities in Dubai quickly tracked al-Sukkari and had him arrested on his return to Egypt.

On June 25, 2009, the Mufti of Egypt Ali Gomaa upheld the sentence against Mustafa and al-Sukkari and ordered their execution by hanging.

On February 4, 2010, the two convicts applied for a revision of the criminal proceedings. They protested their innocence. On March 4th the judgments were overturned and a new trial was ordered. In September 2010, Mustafa's death sentence was commuted to 15 years' imprisonment and al-Sukkari is sentenced to life in prison.

Web links

• Zeit-Online article on the death sentence, May 22, 2009
• New York Times on the death sentence, May 22, 2009

References

1. ^ New York Times, May 22, 2009
2. ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original from March 7, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Report to orf.at from March 4, 2010 
3. ^ Spiegel Online, September 28, 2010