Thursday, October 16, 2008

Save the King's Palace at Edfina

The city of Edfina at Beheira Governorate got a huge wonderful Palace from the Mohamed Ali Royal Era.That palace was built in the 18th Century by the order of Khedive Ismail. Then King Fouad I decided to build new extension to it.
It was built according to the Italianate style from the outside and from inside it is the mix between the Oriental and styles.
It was a gateway to king Farouk especially in the summer because of the weather in Edfina in Delta was chilling comparing to hot Cairo
Now after the revolution that Palace was victim of ignorance
Waguih Abaza who was supposedly from a high class Pre-1952 Family turned it in 1961 to become the headquarter of some governmental Agricultural society !!??ً Well I am not surprised that much after all he turned to be a member in the Vanguard Organization !!
In 1974 President Sadat decided to turn it in to the faculty of Veterinarian following the University of Alexandria according  to presidential decree no.542!!!!!!!!!!!
Can you imagine it ??Already this palace should be among the Presidential palaces and thus the minister of Culture Hosni in 2001 issued an order No.233 that is Palace should follow the high supreme council of antiquities ¨The One Hawas is heading¨and that the Faculty of Veterinarian should be transferred immediately to another building !!
Till now this order has not been implemented !!
Look I respect education so much and I got no problem in turning palaces and villas in to educational buildings after all educating the people is much important still this is no ordinary palace or villa ,it is a King´s Palace !!
I do not know why it is not following the Presidential Palaces authority in the first place.
I found about the forgotten Palace in Al Wafd newspaper From Couple of days.

I really wish people speak about it more and more in order to form a pressure on University of Alexandria to transfer their faculty away from that palace which turned to  be a landmark in Edfina known as the "King's Palace".
Again I am not against the education process in my country but this is a King Palace that the President should stay in when he visits that area , I am not even saying we should sell it like the Salamalak Palace but to restore it as it was.
By the way the garden of that Palace contains very rare plants from all over the World ,strangely thank God some of these Plants have survived till now
Here are more photos I found in Google earth and I thought of sharing with you to know how beautiful that Palace is

Also here its location on the map :


View Larger Map
Photos Source:

  • Mahmoud Oraby "Vet Med Alex"
  • Hisham Ghazi ¨Panoramio"

3 comments:

  1. great page i hope u make it better
    i hope u can visit my group and tell me what u think about it
    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=27329784968

    ReplyDelete
  2. thank you so much Ali
    Your group is wonderful but it needs more information

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am very interested about Edfina palace... how can we help? I recently have made a visit and i was totally outraged by the condition of the palace.... please email me for more information
    my name is karim and my email address is edjetnyc@yahoo.com
    Thanks

    ReplyDelete

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