This month, say Egyptian officials, Omar Effendi, the famous department store, will pass into the hands of a Saudi trading company. The completion of the sale will not only be another stage in the odyssey an icon of the Egyptian economy for more than a century, but an important test of support among a public that has had doubts about the government’s sale of national assets.

Egypt committed itself to selling off much of the public sector in 1991 but, 15 years later, much remains unsold. The process stalled through most of the 1990s, with the government reluctant to take the political risk of surrendering control over the economy. In the last two years, however, the process has accelerated under Mahmoud Mohieddin, the new investment minister, with the state floating shares in telecoms, cement and power-generating companies and even placing one of the country’s big state-owned banks, until recently off-limits, on the block.