Mubarak and sons: Another African first family off to jail

Former Egyptian leader, Hosni Mubarak and his two sons were on Saturday sentenced by a Cairo court to three years in prison for corruption charges.

AP reports that the case, dubbed the “presidential palaces” affair by the Egyptian media, was a retrial that Mubarak and sons embezzled millions of dollars’ worth of state funds over the course of a decade, diverting money meant to pay for renovating and maintaining presidential palaces to instead upgrade their private residences.

Except authorities may deem the punishment as having already been served. But if it withstands appeal, it would officially establish Mubark as a convicted criminal years after the 2011 popular uprising that toppled him.

Mubarak had originally been sentenced to three years over the matter, and his sons to four, but they later appealed, sparking the retrial.

As Egypt’s political tides shifted in the wake of his overthrow, he had been convicted of bearing responsibility for the deaths of protesters but was later acquitted, although that ruling now faces an appeal by prosecutors.

It would be recalled, that a court in Ivory Coast had jailed wife of former President Laurent Gbagbo of Ivory Coast, Lady Simone 20 years for her role in a 2011 post-election crisis in which around 3,000 people were killed.

Gbagbo’s son, Michel, was also convicted and sentenced to five years in prison.

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