Hurghada's Al-Mina Mosque Has Stood Dark Since the Summer Power Cuts, and the Governor Wants Its Minarets Lit Again

The minarets and outer courtyard of Hurghada's Grand Port Mosque — Masjid Al-Mina Al-Kabir, on the seafront in the middle of the city — went dark during the summer's electricity load-shedding and have stayed unlit since it ended. The Red Sea governor has now written to Cairo asking for the lights to come back on, according to Al-Masry Al-Youm.

The paper reports that Dr Walid Abdel Azim, Governor of the Red Sea, has written to Dr Osama al-Azhari, the Minister of Endowments, about relighting the mosque's courtyard and minarets. Load-shedding finished with the summer, but the lighting did not return, and Al-Masry Al-Youm says calls from the tourism sector and from residents have built since.

The lighting work being proposed would cover, according to the paper:

• the minarets and the mosque's architectural detail after dark
• the courtyard itself and its entrances
• the approaches and streets immediately around the mosque

Bashar Abu Talib, head of the Red Sea tourist guides syndicate, told the paper the mosque is no longer only a place of worship but has become over recent years one of Hurghada's landmark religious and tourist buildings, standing in an area with tourist movement all day and on the route of the city tours that run in the evening.

Taha Abu Ashra, a Hurghada resident quoted in the report, said the mosque is a point where religious, tourist and community life intersect, and that lighting the plaza, minarets and entrances would make the area easier to move through after dark as well as better to look at.

Nothing is settled yet. Al-Masry Al-Youm says the governorate, the Endowments Ministry and other bodies have still to work out the technical requirements, how the lighting would be operated, and what the rules governing electricity use in mosques allow. No cost, no contractor, no timetable and no reply from the ministry is reported.

For residents and visitors the practical position is unchanged for now: one of the most visible buildings on Hurghada's waterfront is unlit after sunset, on a stretch where evening tour programmes pass through. The paper places the governor's request inside a wider push to improve services and the look of Hurghada's busiest areas.