Renowned Egyptian journalist Mufid Fawzy dies at 89

Presenter was a legend of televised debates on political and cultural life in Egypt

Hanan Moufid Fawzy with her father, Mufid Fawzy. @hananmoufidfawzy / Instagram

Renowned Egyptian journalist and television presenter Mufid Fawzy died on Sunday following a long illness. He was 89 years old.

His death was lamented by a number of friends and admirers on social media, including Mostafa Bakry, an MP and long time friend who broke the news of his death on Sunday.

Mr Fawzy was admitted to a Cairo hospital in late November to receive treatment for complications following extensive surgery on his bile ducts earlier that month, his daughter, Hanan Fawzy, also a journalist, told media at the time.

In January, the journalist reportedly suffered an injury to his shoulder joint which could not be surgically resolved. His daughter asked his audience to pray for his recovery at the time.

Though his doctors expected him to make a full recovery, Mr Fawzy was reportedly left in severe pain following November’s surgery. Mr Bakry at the time called on President Abdel Fattah El Sisi to move Mr Fawzy into a military hospital to ensure he was receiving the best possible care.

Earlier this year, Mr Fawzy also suffered a bout of illness following the death of two of his closest friends, journalist Salah Montasser and renowned actor Samir Sabri, who both died in May.

Dubbed the “debater”, Mr Fawzy began his career writing for some of Egypt’s top publications including Rose Al Youssef, a once great political magazine founded in 1925, and over his six-decade career earned a reputation for being a particularly shrewd and unyielding interviewer.

He conducted televised interviews with some of Egypt’s most renowned public figures including Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz, composer and virtuoso Mohamed Abdel Wahab and former commander of the armed forces Mohamed Abou Ghazala.

He went on to interview Egypt’s former president Hosni Mubarak four times at different stages of his 30 years in power.

Mr Fawzy also interviewed every interior minister who served under Mubarak in a number of widely-watched television segments.

In the 1990s, he launched his well-known Talk of the Town television show, which he hosted for 25 years uninterrupted, where he spoke to some of the country’s top artists, intellectuals and politicians.