Report of the Special Mission to Egypt under Lord Milner, and related papers [‎148r] (298/473)

9
departments, for the most part non-Egyptian, has become increasingly independent of
the Council of Ministers. A growing resentment at the number of posts monopolised
by the British was noticed for a long period antecedent to the war. Egyptian officials
of long experience and considerable competence felt that they were definitely excluded
from rising to the highest positions in view of the system consecrated by prescription
that a post once held by a non-Egyptian was, on its becoming vacant, automatically
filled by a non-Egyptian.
Particular resentment was occasioned in Egypt at the time of the arrival of the
Mission by a recent increase in the numbers of the British engaged for the public
service. This increase, if it was greatly exaggerated by ill-informed rumour, was
nevertheless appreciable, and affected also a few very subordinate offices hitherto filled
by natives of the country. It may here be mentioned that the number of British
officials has risen from a few hundred in the earlier years of the occupation to upwards
of sixteen hundred at^ the present day, with scales of pay different from those enjoyed
by the Egyptians. These higher scales, if amply justified by special circumstances,
were readily represented as constituting a grievance.
Another feature of Egyptian life has undoubtedly contributed to the unrest. As
British officials have increased in number they have more and more lived apart from
the Egyptian community, and their chief residential quarter on the Island of Ghezireh
has come to be a self-contained community, furnished, like an Indian cantonment,
with a complete equipment for social intercourse, sport and physical exercise. This
has added to the amenities of life for the official class, but it has withdrawn them from
society with Egyptians and tended to create a British enclave An area of land belonging to one country and entirely surrounded by land of just one other country. from which Egyptians
are excluded. \\ e are aware of the difficulties on both sides which stand in the way
of free and unembarrassed relations between men and women of different races and
customs, but when the necessary allowance has been made it must, we think, be said
that the increasing segregation of the British community, which has been a feature
of recent years, has been a cause of estrangement between British and Egyptians and
made the fact of an alien occupation more obtrusive than it need have been.
M e have noticed with pleasure the cordial and intimate relations which many old
residents in Egypt, and not a few senior officials and their wives, have established
with then Egyptian neighbours, and we have seen much evidence of the value and
influence of these iri end ships in the recent times of stress and difficulty. We are
com meed that it would^ greatly help if more efforts were made to cultivate these
neighbourly relations. Ihe lorms and conventions of conduct should be studied and
careful 1\ le spec ted by British residents in Egypt and visitors to Egypt. It should be
realised, especially by the latter, that altogether disproportionate harm may be done
by onences against good taste which, though trivial in themselves, cause comment and
scandal. It should, in general, be the aim of the British residents and visitors to
break down the barriers that exist rather than to create new ones, to enter as far as
possible into the life oi the Egyptian people, to learn enough of their language to
make social contact possible and agreeable, and to avoid the minor causes of offence
which in the aggregate become mischievous.
i} • «| ie - ?^I er l iaiK V a criticism not infrequently heard that the quality of the
iitis i officials has deteriorated does not seem to us to be justified. There are many
o cials of high capacity in Egypt to-day, as there were in former times men of
exceptional and others of only moderate calibre. But the critical sense of the
^ gyptians ms been greatly developed by progress and contact with other countries,
am t e} iave become more exacting than the older generation with regard to
standards of efficiency.
~ ^ am ; s i ace the retirement in 1907 of Lord Cromer, there have been no less than .
i i r J tlSl1 A S ents 01 Hi#} 1 Commissioners, and Egypt has felt herself to some extent
a ic < or successive experiments. The result of these repeated changes, due to the
acci ent at circumstances, tended to increase the independence of the permanent
n ^ 1 ° ? ia i’ ™° were rnore concerned with departmental efficiency than with
ques ions o policy, while to Egyptian observers they conveyed an impression of uncer
tainty and instability. ^ ^
Another contributory cause of the general discontent was the manifest insuccess
^ e< U( : a lona policy resulting in the production of an unnecessarily large and ever-
inci easing number of candidates for official posts, provided with examination certificates,
u es i ute of any real educational culture. It was necessary in the initial stage to
lam a num )ei of young men to such a standard of efficiency as would enable them to
unc ei a e c encal duties in State departments which had hitherto been largely
p 61 . 0ri P ef A non-Egyptians, and to prepare pupils for the higher colleges of medicine,
aw an engineering. But here again there seems, until quite recently, to have been
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