Egyptian Minister of Planning, Hala Al-Saeed, affirmed that the Egyptian government is working on social empowerment of citizens by providing the opportunity for greater social participation of women and expanding their capacities by eliminating the negative phenomena that threaten their lives, safety and dignity.

He added, in an interview with “Arabs Today”, that 34% of the government investments during the current fiscal year will be to meet the constitutional entitlements and achieve human and social development that sets the top priority to improve the quality of life of citizens, especially in education, health, culture, youth and sports.

He added that 6% of these investments will be channeled to local development programs aimed at improving and providing services and ensuring the quality of public facilities to reduce the burden on citizens throughout the country, taking into account social justice in the distribution of the fruits of growth and achieving balanced regional development.

In response to rumors over the start of the transfer of a large number of employees to early retirement, the Minister of Planning confirmed that early retirement procedures are incorrect and there are provisions of the civil service law that will be applied to everyone as previously announced.

She added that the plan aims to develop planning, follow-up, decentralization and enabling localities to participate in the preparation and follow-up of the implementation of the plan and to educate citizens about the projects and programs that the government intends to implement throughout the Republic.

She stressed that development plan requires extensive institutional and economic reform, saying that she adopts a variety of mechanisms to achieve this, including the implementation of an effective method of selecting leaders in the government apparatus, implementing specialized and high quality training programs.

She added that the government investments in education and health amounted to 24 billion and 380 million pounds in the budget of the current year. The sum of 7.24 billion pounds was allocated for the development of pre-university education and financed by the public treasury of the state by 91 percent. The state treasury is financed by 56%. The government investments targeted by the Ministry of Scientific Research programs amount to LE 1.66 billion and the state treasury is financed by 86%.

She stressed that government investments aimed at achieving human and social development in the 2017-2018 plan are consistent with constitutional obligations, presidential mandates and the Government's plan to develop the education and health systems. The investments come in response to parliamentary and popular demands for increased investments in the education and health sectors, As the highest return to invest in the future of Egypt.