February 16th, 2011 by Alec

POMED Executive Director, Stephen McInerney, was interviewed on Tuesday by Lisa Mullins on Public Radio International’s The World about the role of the United States’ Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) in funding Egyptian civil society groups and the influence this had on the protest movement.

For full audio, click here.  Download the mp3 here.

On democracy and governance assistance to Egypt in comparison to military aid:

“Proportionally, support for democracy assistance is in the neighborhood of 30 million dollars annually, through a variety of different accounts in Egypt, which is quite small.”

The role of MEPI funds on the protest movement:

“It has played some role in helping, kind of, support and sustain some of the young organizations that have wanted to be more politically active.”

“The protest movement is overwhelmingly indigenously Egyptian, and I think we would have definitely seen this protest movement emerge without any U.S. support or any U.S. involvement.”

“Some of the actors who have been involved with the protest movement have been more effective and more organized, connected, and networked than they might have been without our support.” 

Posted in Democracy Promotion, Egypt, Foreign Aid, POMED, US foreign policy |