According to the highly reliable source that is Wikipedia, Egypt has had 29 capital cities over the past 5,000 years. The incumbent, Cairo, has been in place since 950 AD, so, in the scheme of things, it was due a change-up. 

Perhaps that’s why, last week at an economic development conference, the Egyptian government announced it was planning a giant new building project to the east of Cairo. The new city, which could eventually cover 700 km sq, doesn’t currently have a name, and is being referred to simply as “The Capital” (we’re really hoping this is a Hunger Games reference).

If all goes to plan, the city will serve as the new administrative and financial capital of Egypt. Amazingly, the ministry claims that development could be finished within five to seven years, and construction on the road that will link the two cities has already begun. 

You could be forgiven for being a little confused as to why a country would shift its capital of over a thousand years 50km to the east, seemingly for the hell of it. Here are a few reasons the project looks so appealing to the Egyptian government . 

Cairo is full

The population of Cairo’s larger metropolitan area is nearing 20m, and, as a result, it’s one of the most congested cities on earth: the World Bank estimated in 2010 that traffic costs amount to about 4 per cent of Egypt’s entire GDP. 

In this sense, the new development could be seen as an extension of the old city, to cut down on overpopulation and congestion. The housing ministry claims the capital could house up to 7m people; the initial plans include 1.1m residences, 1,250 mosques and churches, and 663 hospitals. That said, “New Cairo”, a relatively new development to the east, was built for millions of residents, but is still only home to a few hundred thousand.

Still, Cairo’s population is expected to double over the next 40 years, so a new satellite city does make some kind of sense. But why move the country’s capital too? 

The president wants to make a statement

Abdel Fattah el-Sisi was elected president in June 2014, and subsequently told the Egyptian people to prepare for the “hard work phase” in their country’s recent history, to help the country’s economy recover from the effects of the 2011 revolution. That revolution played out in old Cairo, and centred on Tahrir square, the site of many of Cairo’s current administrative buildings. 

Mubarak, Egyptian president between 1981 and 2011, actually tried to build a new capital too during his own tenure, but that project failed. If Sisi can succeed, and physically move the government away from the ghosts of the revolution to boot, it’ll show he can overcome Egypt’s previous setbacks and political tensions and move the country – and, hopefully, its economy – forward. 

Image: Getty.

The Egyptian governemnt may not have to pay for it

The government has hired a Dubai-based real estate investment fund, headed by Emirati Mohamed Alabbar, the man behind the Burj Khalifa, to raise funds for the project and build it. By the end of last week’s conference, around $12bn had been pledged by Gulf-based investors, which is over a quarter of the total (that’s if the project stays within budget, of course).

The Egyptian people must be hoping for big foreign investment, too: Sisi has already cut food and energy subsidies and raised fuel prices to help the country’s ailing economy, which has led some to criticise the announcement of a grand new city project while Egypt’s poorest go hungry. 

The Suez canal is getting wider

Another important factor is the city’s location: it will lie between Cairo and the Suez Canal, with its profitable trade routes. Under a new expansion project, the Egyptian government is expanding the canal, to allow boats to sail in both directions at once (it goes both directions at the moment, but along most of its length its only wide enough to go one way at once), potentially doubling the trade revenue generated. 

Here’s the planned location, a short hop from both New Cairo and El Shorouk city (the two blobs just to the north of the new capital). 

This will bring the city much closer to the canal,  using up what is at present just a stretch of desert: 

It’s been done before

…though not particularly successfully. Malaysia moved parts of its central governemnt from Kuala Lumpur to the newly built Putrahaya in 1999, while in 2005 the Burmese government shifted from Yangon to the brand new city of Naypyidaw (though that city is reportedly still half empty). Egypt, meanwhile, has built over 20 “new towns” over the past half century, most of which are still very sparsely populated. Looks like President Sisi has a real job on his hands.