Egypt redraws Cairo's administrative borders to enclose new capital's parliament headquarters

Ahram Online , Sunday 6 Feb 2022

Egypt has redrawn Cairo's administrative borders to enclose 46,000 feddans (nearly 193, 000 km2) of the 184,000-feddan New Administrative Capital (NAC), in which the new headquarters of House of Representatives and Senate are located, in order to fit the country's constitution that requires both bodies be headquartered in the Egyptian capital.

File photo of the parliament building in the New Administrative Capital

The new space includes the 40,000-feddan first phase of the NAC, in addition to 6,000 feddans designated for transport linkage grid with other country's cities, a statement by the Egyptian National Center for Planning State Land Uses (NCPSLU) said on Sunday.

The construction on the 700-square-kilometre NAC, which is nearly twice the area of Cairo governorate prior to redrawing its administrative borders, started in 2015 and is set to house 6.5 million people when completed. The NAC is located 60 km from Cairo in the area between the Cairo-Suez and Cairo-Ain Sokhna roads.

The NAC boasts a government district with 10 ministerial complexes that will house 34 ministries, in addition to the headquarters of the cabinet and the House of Representatives.

The new capital will be connected to the Greater Cairo area via various transport network systems that include the country's first monorail train.

The Egyptian government has stated moving to the NAC's government district since December as per presidential directives to relocate public employees to the new city for a 6-month test run.