Since last year the fate of Nile University, Egypt's first research university, has been uncertain. Its purpose-built campus has been “conceded” to the Zewail City of Science and Technology, an initiative of renowned Egyptian-American scientist and 1999 Nobel Chemistry Prize winner Ahmed Zewail.

Nile University had been scheduled to move to the campus at the beginning of 2011, but when Mubarak was toppled from power, it was announced that the land and buildings would instead be allocatd to the Zewail City of Science and Technology.

Nile University has suffered because of its association with Ahmed Nazif, a former prime minister who last year received a one-year suspended sentence on corruption charges. It has been argued that by reallocating the land the state was “rectifying” the situation. However, Egypt's netizens are almost unanimous in their condemnation of the move.

Nile University, Giza, Egypt. Image by Mahmoud Allam, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).

In a recent post blogger Zeinab Mohamed outlined the situation:

In 2000 The Zewail city of science and research’s corner stone was set up in a location in 6th of October area and 300 acres were allocated to that project. It was too good to be true then the project faced a lot of red tape and bureaucracy and in the end Zewail left and returned back to the States. […] Now after the ousting of Mubarak and during the good old days of PM Essam Sharaf, we found out that the old project of Zewail is resurrected again in which for sure is something great but there was a price: wiping out the Nile University (NU) and merging it inside the new Zewail city without even recognizing its achievements. Zewail will take the NU, its students and researches for no price at all!! The buildings of those 127 acres re-allocated to NU are now part of Zewail city. Not only that, but the buildings and the NU facilities were closed for months in front of the NU students with no regard for their researches!!

Image from the Facebook page of Save NILE University: Don't Kill Research in Egypt

Nile University teacher Mahmoud Allam commented [ar]:

Journalist Salamah Abdulhameed added [ar]:

However, Egyptian poet Farouk Goweda supports Zewail City and wrote [ar]:

Logo of Save Nile University campaign. Image from the Facebook page of Save NILE University: Don't Kill Research in Egypt

Zeinab Mohamed linked to the online campaign:

The students and the researchers have launched a big campaign to Save NU whether online or offline through protests and sits in. Here is the official Save NU website and its official FB page. They do not want to be a part of the Zowail city.

Assistant researcher Heba Shalaby stands by the position of Nile University, and addressed its faculty and students:

@HebaShalaby: As long as your cause is righteous, and you're doing your best, you have nothing more to worry about.