The relocation of employees has started on Sunday, the first batch being cabinet employees, Abbas said in a phone-in with DMC TV satellite channel on Tuesday evening.

Each week, the employees of two or three ministries will be relocated and they should all be resuming work from the NAC by April, he added.

According to a previous cabinet statement, the government offices that deal directly with the public will not be transferred to the new capital for the time being.

The government has offered the state employees who will have their workplace moved to the new capital either to receive a transport allowance or a housing allowance to buy units in or close to the new capital.

Around 9,000 housing units have been allocated for the public employees moving to the NAC and work is currently underway to finalise the procedures of mortgage finance with banks to hand these units to the employees, according to Abbas.

Some 20,000 units are being constructed by the Ministry of Housing, Utilities, and Urban Communities and are expected to be delivered gradually from March till the end of the year.

Transportation modes, including the country's first monorail, the light rail transit (LRT), and terminals will also be available for employees who stay in their residences outside the NAC, said Abbas. 

Employees working from the NAC have been attending training programmes to carry out the work in the designated government smart buildings digitally.

The governmental district has 10 ministerial complexes that will house 34 ministries, in addition to the headquarters of the cabinet and parliament.

Egypt has redrawn Cairo's administrative borders to include 46,000 feddans of the 184,000-feddan NAC.

The construction of the NAC on 700-square kilometres started in 2015 and is set to house 6.5 million people when completed.

The NAC is located 60km from Cairo, between Cairo-Suez and Cairo-Ain Sokhna roads.