Two railway officials have been arrested after they allegedly forced a pair of fare dodgers to jump from a moving train – fatally injuring one and causing another to lose his leg.
The scandal happened when the man who died, identified as Mohamed Eid, was caught together with another man, named as Ahmed Mohamed, without a ticket for a train journey between the Mediterranean Sea city of Alexandria to the southern city of Luxor.
The conductor then demanded that the pair pay a fine of 70 EGP (3.38 GBP) but the two who were street traders told him they had no money.
In a video that then went viral, passengers are seen alleging that the conductor had “forced” the pair to leave the train while it was still moving in the province of Tanta north of Cairo.
They said that although it had been slowing down, it was still going fast enough to cause significant injury, and that one of the man died while the other had his leg torn off.
The two men arrested have denied being to blame, with the conductor saying: “I didn’t do anything wrong and they were the ones who decided to jump.”
He said they had opened the door of the train to leap out because they did not have the money for the ticket and wanted to avoid trouble when they arrived at the station.
The pair are facing charges of premeditated murder, and has already widened to include demands that Egypt’s Transport Minister, Kamel Al Wazir, be forced to resign.
He has already spoken out in the incident, saying that it was based on an individual’s mistake would not be allowed to happen again. He also said the full weight of the law would fall on any employees found guilty.
He also pledged cash support for the family of the dead man and compensation for the injured man.
The scandal follows a crackdown by railway officials on fare dodgers in a bid to improve revenue to upgrade services.
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Story By: Michael Leidig, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Central European News
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