The North Giza Labor Misdemeanor Court on Monday fined the chairman of the board of Al-Bawaba News, journalist Abdelrahim Ali, 13,000 Egyptian pounds (about $250) for each of the 257 journalists and workers at the institution.
According to a brief statement by the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights (ECESR), which represents the aggrieved journalists in the lawsuit, the total fines amounted to 3,341,000 pounds (about $64,250). The ruling followed the conviction of the institution’s legal representative for “refusing to implement the minimum wage.”
The court also compelled the chairman, according to the statement, to pay 2,000 pounds (about $38) as “temporary civil compensation” to 25 journalists who filed the lawsuit as civil claimants.
Sameh Samir, a human rights lawyer at the ECESR, described the fine as “historic,” emphasizing that the norm in labor cases had been the issuance of symbolic fines. “Usually, courts rule for 1,000 or 2,000 pounds per individual, but 3 million is something we are seeing for the first time,” he told Al Manassa.
Samir explained that the ruling sets a precedent for labor disputes, as it marks the first time a civil claim has been heard by a “labor misdemeanor” court since the system was activated last October following the issuance of the new Labor Law.
“It is clear that the judicial system is taking the Labor Law with the utmost seriousness, and punishing those who violate the rights of their workers,” he added.
Samir noted that the management of Al-Bawaba News tried during the sessions to deny the violation by submitting documentation stating that the minimum wage had been applied. However, the court rejected these claims, given its prior review of the employees’ files in the “arbitrary dismissal” cases pending before it. He pointed out that the merging of labor jurisdictions under the new law also enabled the court to issue a ruling “proportionate to the offense.”
The beginning of this dispute dates back to a complaint received by the Dokki Labor Office from 257 employees at Al-Bawaba News. The office referred the complaint to the court after proving that the company’s management committed a violation by failing to implement the National Wage Council’s Decision No. 15 of 2025 regarding the minimum wage. This action violated Article 104 of the new Labor Law, which mandates establishments subject to its provisions to implement the council’s decisions, according to a previous ECESR statement.
The crisis dates back to the last quarter of 2025, when the management began taking arbitrary measures in response to journalists’ demands to apply the minimum wage. About 70 journalists held a sit-in that lasted 56 days at the newspaper’s headquarters on Mossadak Street in Dokki, during which they faced cuts to basic services, culminating in the forceful dispersal of their sit-in on the evening of Sunday, January 5, 2026. This forced them to move their protest to the Journalists Syndicate.
Management targeted journalists by withholding their salaries since November 2025 and filing reports accusing a number of them of “unauthorized protesting.” These reports also targeted syndicate board members Eman Ouf and Mahmoud Kamel because of the solidarity of the syndicate’s board, headed by Khaled Elbalshy, with the journalists’ demands.
In a session held Sunday, the Qasr Al-Nil Misdemeanor Court acquitted nine journalists from Al-Bawaba News and syndicate board members Mahmoud Kamel and Eman Ouf of charges of libeling the newspaper’s chairman, Abdelrahim Ali, and his daughter Dalia, the editor-in-chief, according to a statement by the ECESR.
The court also rejected a compensation claim filed by the newspaper’s management against the journalists, which had sought to compel them to pay temporary civil compensation of more than 100,000 pounds ($1,900) to the chairman and his daughter.
