President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi issued a presidential decree appointing Lt. General Mohamed Abdel Rahman Bassiouny Salem Rabie, head of the Armed Forces Operations Authority, as head of the “National Authority for Crisis and Emergency Management,” effective July 9, 2026.
The name “National Authority for Crisis and Emergency Management” appeared for the first time on Tuesday, when President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi inaugurated the “strategic command headquarters,” which is responsible for managing and coordinating the work of state agencies and various governorates during crises.
The decree also appointed Major General Hani Mahmoud Sayed Mansour, director of the Armed Forces Signal Corps, as deputy head of the National Authority for Crisis and Emergency Management, according to a statement published by the official spokesperson for the presidency.
Maj. Gen. Sameh Nabil Youssef was also appointed as the Ministry of Interior’s representative and assistant head of the authority.
The decree did not disclose any civilian representation within the formation of the National Authority for Crisis and Emergency Management, whether from ministries, governorates, or government agencies.
During the inaugural event, El-Sisi said establishing the center was not a new idea, but rather a system applied in many countries to protect their citizens and develop their capacities and capabilities to confront disasters.
Addressing the nature of the new authority and the overlap between its mandate and that of the Civil Protection Department within the Ministry of Interior’s Specialized Police Sector, El-Sisi said in his speech that “civil protection personnel already exist in Egypt, but it was necessary to organize these capabilities and establish a unified entity that provides strong and structured support to avoid a random response during disasters.”
He added that the concept of the state goes beyond merely providing citizens’ daily living needs.
Before the creation of the new authority, for which no official founding decree has yet been published in the Official Gazette, crisis and disaster management and risk reduction were assigned to a “national committee.”
The first decree forming said committee was issued in December 2016 as an administrative committee under the Cabinet’s Information and Decision Support Center (IDSC). The center’s head chaired the committee in its initial formation.
The committee’s original formation included the head of the Armed Forces Crisis Management Center and representatives from all ministries and governorates, as well as representatives of sovereign, security, and oversight bodies, including the General Intelligence Service and the Administrative Control Authority.
It also included representatives of several bodies, such as the Suez Canal Authority, the State Information Service, the Egyptian Radio and Television Union, and the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics.
In March 2024, another decree reconstituted the committee, transferring administrative supervision over it directly to the Cabinet’s General Secretariat instead of the IDSC, and assigning its chairmanship to the assistant secretary-general of the Cabinet for crisis and disaster management affairs.
The 2024 decree added other government bodies that were not represented in the 2016 decision, including the director of the National Emergency and Public Safety Network and the head of the Egyptian Ambulance Authority, while adding the Administrative Control Authority as a member of the coordinating committee.
The decision also introduced an organizational requirement obliging all governorates to seek the opinion and approval of the relevant security authorities before carrying out any annual field drills or simulation exercises to confront disasters.
