Hassan Malek lives in Heliopolis, an upper-class neighborhood in Cairo full of high-end shopping malls, Italian restaurants, modern apartment buildings, and ornate villas. Much of Cairo is chaotic, crowded, and poor, and Heliopolis’s broad, manicured avenues create an atmosphere of exclusivity and privilege. It was likely jarring when, early one morning five years ago, policemen barricaded Malek’s street, ransacked his home, and threw him in jail. This was what the Mubarak regime did to men like Malek, who was not only a member of the Muslim Brotherhood but also very rich.
“They allowed me to reach a certain level, but there was a ceiling,” says Malek, 53, who as the chairman of the Malek Group runs the Egyptian branches of a Turkish furniture company, Istikbal, and a clothing brand called Sarar. Mild-mannered and serious in conservative suits, Malek would easily blend in with the Wall Street crowd.
