Salah Diab

Egyptian leading entrepreneur and engineer Salah El-Deen Ahmed Tawfik Diab, known as Salah Diab, is the founder and the major shareholder of Al Masry Al Youm. He established the newspaper in 2004 and has been its chairman since then.

A prominent member of the liberal al-Wafd political party, Diab was a strong supporter of the Mubarak regime. After the 2011 revolution, it was revealed that he benefited from this regime since the 1990’s by buying land from the government for supposed agricultural projects and building resorts to make profit. Moreover, Al Masry Al Youm never criticized the former President and his family.

Salah Diab is mostly known for being the co-founder and CEO of the Project and Investment Consulting Company (PICO), the first Egyptian oil services company, also operating in several markets, from the food to the real estate industries. In Egypt, PICO companies have the monopoly in importing seeds. It also imports gold.

Diab has been arrested several times by the Egyptian authorities for various accusations. In 2011, he was interrogated for violating a contract with the agriculture ministry in a real estate project, along with Mahmoud Al-Gamal - one of Egypt's wealthiest businessmen and real estate magnates, also the father of former President Mubarak’s daughter in law. In 2015, Diab was briefly detained for corruption allegations in a number of financial cases, and incidents related to waste of public funds. In 2016, he made the headlines after the Panama Papers leaked revealed that he used offshore firms in oil deals with the Egyptian government. A year later, it was reported that he is involved in 29 cases of food scandals through the Pico companies La Poire and On the Run convenience stores.

According to news reports, the Diab family owns the Halliburton franchise - an American oil company, headed by Vice President Dick Cheney. Diab has also been accused of receiving American support for the founding of Al Masry Al Youm. He responded to this accusation by saying that he was not the sole owner of the newspaper, since Almasry Establishment is a joint stock company. However, he did not disclose the shareholding structure. During his arrest in 2015, the US State Department announced that it was following his case since Diab has investments with the United States and strong relations in Washington and the United Arab Emirates.

Coming from the Al Beheira governorate known for implementing extensive agricultural projects, the Diab family is one of the wealthiest families of the country. It owns 43 US companies franchisee and is also one of Israel's largest business partners in Egypt. It is believed that Salah Diab was a trade representative for Egypt when former Minister of Petroleum, Engineer Sameh Fahmy sold gas oil field to the US company Halliburton, which Egyptian franchise belong to the Diab family.