Snapshot from ONTV of TV host Liliane Daoud
Lebanese former ONTV host Liliane Daoud said on Tuesday night that she is committed to fighting through all the legal and diplomatic channels available so as to be able to return to Cairo as soon as possible, a day after she was deported from Egypt to Beirut.
"I chose to travel to Beirut where I am now safe with family, and I commit to fighting all legal and diplomatic avenues available to me to be able to return to Cairo as soon as possible, to be reunited with my daughter and be able to continue the life I have built for her there, close to her family and friends," Daoud wrote on her Twitter account on Tuesday night.
On Monday, Daoud was arrested at her Cairo house and transported to Cairo airport for deportation. It came hours after she ended her contract with the privately-owned Egyptian channel ONTV, which she joined in June 2011.
Her Egyptian ex-husband, Khaled El-Berry, was coincidentally present at her home during the arrest while picking up their ten-year-old daughter for dinner.
"They gave [Daoud] exactly five minutes. They refused to allow her to take anything with her except her wallet. They also refused to let her call a lawyer or the [Lebanese] embassy," El-Berry wrote on his Facebook account.
El-Berry stressed that Daoud has Egyptian residency because she was married to him for six years.
However, Daoud wrote on Twitter that when she asked the authorities about the reason for her deportation, they told her that they have orders from "sovereign entities" without giving further details.
Daoud's show The Complete Picture, which ran for five years, was among the very few TV programmes that gave a platform to political opposition figures to speak freely on air.
Her decision to leave ONTV came one day after Mohamed El-Garhy -- the producer of the famous Gaber El-Armouty's TV show "Headlines", on the same TV channel -- announced he and the show's anchor would leave after seven years at the station.
These changes at the station come one month after ONTV was acquired by steel tycoon Ahmed Abu-Hashima.
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