Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly meets on Saturday with his Jordanian counterpart, Bisher Al-Khasawneh. Egyptian Cabinet
The meeting discussed the workflow and future horizons of the NAC mega project, according to a statement by the Egyptian cabinet.
During the meeting, Al-Khasawneh said Jordan seeks to benefit from the Egyptian mega infrastructure projects, especially the construction of the new big roads and axes leading to the NAC.
Jordan seeks to apply this experience to challenges facing big Jordanian cities, including Amman and Zarqa, Al-Khasawneh said. He noted that the growing population of both cities is expected to require Jordan develop a new urban centre.
The Egyptian model has encouraged Jordan to establish such an urban centre, providing a viable and attractive framework.
Al-Khasawneh said Egypt’s new capital was “mere ink on paper in 2016, but today I was amazed to see these giant projects.”
He congratulated the Egyptian side on the advanced stages that the NAC has reached.
Egypt started to construct the new capital east of Cairo in 2015 over a total area of 170,000 feddans away from the traffic congestion in Cairo to host all ministries, parliament, government institutions as well as residential units and all services.
The state is set to inaugurate the fourth-generation city by the end of this year and relocate tens of thousands of employees there. NAC is set to house 6.5 million people.
This first official visit by a foreign official to the cabinet’s new headquarters in NAC reflects the deep relations between Egypt and Jordan, Madbouly said during Saturday’s meeting.
Besides the political and developmental goals, the establishment of NAC is aimed at creating hundreds of thousands of job opportunities, reducing unemployment and promoting investments, Madbouly said.
Al-Khasawneh started an official visit to Egypt on Thursday to discuss with Madbouly the means to promote bilateral relations between Egypt and Jordan.
In press remarks during his visit, Al-Khasawneh said Jordan and Egypt share priorities in development and economic coordination, Egyptian state’s news agency MENA reported.
The two countries also have strategic interests in cooperation with Iraq through trilateral summits which started in Cairo, and were followed by more elsewhere, he added.
On cooperation in the oil field, the Jordanian premier said “some strategic projects have already been determined,” including an oil pipeline which will stretch from Iraq to Jordan and then to Egypt, as well as an industrial zone that will be established on the Jordan-Iraq border soon, which will also have benefits for Egypt.
Coordination also includes contracting projects, the reconstruction of Iraq, and achieving benefits for the Arab countries and their peoples, he said.
Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, Iraq's Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, and Jordan's King Abdullah II held their fourth summit late in June in Baghdad as the triad aims to promote cooperation mechanisms and reinforce political consultation on regional issues.
During the summit, the leaders tackled trilateral cooperation, and other issues of mutual concern including Arab water rights, Libya’s crisis and the Palestinian cause.
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