If you've been to Cairo in recent years, chances are you visited the Citadel, a huge medieval fortress that sits high above the city and houses the Mohammed Ali Pasha Mosque. This magnificent Ottoman style structure was completed in 1850 and is considered to be one of the biggest in the Islamic world.
The Citadel fortress also houses Egypt's Military Museum, a not so interesting hall of exhibits, excepting for a fine statue of Saladin and a war chariot from Pharaoh Tutankhamen's tomb. There are also three dioramas featuring periods of Egyptian history, including one dedicated to the now deposed despot dictator and former President Hosni Mubarak.
After a tyrannical 30 year rule, Mubarak the fourth president of Egypt, was forced from office during the recent revolution and now the new government is revealing the real truth behind the corruption and abuse of power that has restricted Egypt from realising its true potential for three decades.
Apart from trying to locate billions of Egypt's missing dollars, new government officials are busy expunging Hosni Mubarak and his wife Suzanne Mubarak's name from hundreds of dedicated buildings, universities, schools, roads, playgrounds, orphanages etc. Most are being replaced with "Revolution" or "25th January", the date of the overthrown dictator being forced from office.
One can now wonder the fate of the ridiculously huge oil painting that dominates Mubarak's diorama and shows him as the benefactor of all Egyptian peoples, marching to freedom surrounded by his military generals and ministers, most of whom are now in jail accused of gross breaches of trust and self-enrichment. It makes you sick to see the adoring peasants and citizens of upper Egypt, shown in traditional dress surrounding their leader, whilst peace doves settle at his feet. A far cry from the truth when he was actually stealing the bread from the mouths of their starving children.
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