Egypt Daily News – President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi issued a directive to reconstitute the Board of Trustees of the Grand Egyptian Museum Authority for a period of three years, headed by the President of Egypt.
According to Resolution No. 600 of 2024, the new Board of Trustees of the Grand Egyptian Museum included 5 Arab and international figures, including former Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, and Deputy Director General of the National Museum of Nature and Science in Japan, Yuji Kurihara.
Among the international figures included in the new Board of Trustees is Prince Sultan bin Salman, advisor to the Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz and the first Arab astronaut, Sheikh Tahnoun bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Ruler of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, in addition to the Secretary-General of the World Tourism Organization (in his capacity) .
President Sisi’s decision included the appointment of 11 Egyptians to the Board of Trustees of the Grand Egyptian Museum: the Ministers of Tourism, Antiquities, Culture, and Finance, the Director of the Library of Alexandria, the Egyptologist and former Minister of Antiquities, Dr. Zahi Hawass, the former Egyptian Minister of Culture, Farouk Hosni, and the CEO of the Bank of Egypt, Hisham Okasha.
It was former Egyptian Minister of Culture, Farouk Hosni who actually initiated the idea and the building of the Grand Egyptian Museum.
The decision also included the appointment of Egyptian businessman Mohamed Lotfy Mansour, journalist Sherif Amer, UN Under-Secretary-General Ghada Waly, and the former Egyptian Minister of Antiquities, Egypt’s candidate for the position of Director-General of UNESCO, Dr. Khaled Al-Anani.
Egypt built the Grand Egyptian Museum building on an area of more than 300,000 square meters to include a number of exhibition halls, each of which is considered larger than many current museums in Egypt and the world, according to the official website of the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities.
The partial trial operation of the Grand Egyptian Museum began as of next Wednesday, October 16, 2024, as a trial operation of the main hall of the museum and the gradual operation of some parts of the museum in preparation for the official grand opening.
At the beginning of last October, the administration of the Grand Egyptian Museum announced that the work on the main exhibition halls of the museum had been completely completed and that they were 100% ready with regard to displaying the artifacts inside the two display windows.
The halls include artifacts from the pre-dynastic era to the Greco-Roman era according to a museum display scenario at the highest level that narrates 3 main topics about ancient Egyptian civilization.
The main building of the Grand Egyptian Museum contains 12 exhibition halls equipped with the latest sound and light technologies, in addition to more than 50,000 antiquities, some of which were transferred in 2016 from Luxor Governorate. Among the most prominent of these pieces are: military chariots, funerary beds, and the treasures of King Tutankhamun.
