CAIRO — Egypt’s Giza Criminal Court continued July 3 the retrial of Habib al-Adly, the interior minister under President Hosni Mubarak, on charges of misappropriating 530 million Egyptian pounds (almost $29 million) from the Interior Ministry. 

All eyes are now focused on the defense to see whether Adly will follow in the footsteps of a number of Mubarak regime tycoons and submit a request to reconcile with the state and give back the misappropriated funds in exchange for charges being dropped.

The option for so-called reconciliation deals became available in July 2015 with the amendment of Article 18(b) of Egypt's Code of Criminal Procedures on reconciliation in cases of misappropriation of public funds in the event the funds in question were reinstated. This followed the state’s failed attempts to recover funds that the Mubarak regime’s tycoons allegedly smuggled overseas.

Those failed attempts were disclosed when member of the House of Representatives Mustapha Al-Gundi and other members called June 16 for a pressing inquiry into the 500 million Egyptian pounds (almost $28 million) in expenses spent by the successive looted funds recovery committees in allowances.