Cairo calm on first strike\'s day

Cairo witnessed a quite Saturday morning on its first day of strike called by several movements and coalitions. There are conflicting reports about the public sector strikes.  According to the Centre for Trade Union and Workers Services, employees and drivers of Egypt\'s underground metro have started a slowdown strike.  However the Minister of Transportation made statements on Saturday early afternoon confirming that all public transports were functioning regularly. Trains were quite regular except for railroad workshops workers who protested expressing their demands. Airport workers have reportedly not answered calls for a national strike, neither have the Suez Canal workers. In addition no major factories have declared industrial action. The strike was a bit more intense in universities around the country. Most of them have witnessed calls for strike and received different amount of participation. Sit-ins and rallies were held in a number of universities including, Cairo, Ain Shams, Mansoura, American and the German universities. A few high schools supported the strike as well. The strike marks the first anniversary of the popular overthrow of Hosni Mubarak. It is yet expected to get more intense in the next two days since a few workers’ unions have announced their participation to the strike starting from tomorrow. Moreover, many schools and institutions usually have Saturdays off, which means their strike will start from Sunday. Political and student groups calling for the strike, hope that it will continue intensively and that it will turn into a civil disobedience demanding the Supreme Council of Armed Forces, now ruling the country, to hand power to civilians.