Mohamed Sherif Pasha

For other people with the same name, see Muhammed Sharif (disambiguation).

Mohamed Sherif محمد شريف
3rd Prime Minister of Egypt
In office 7 April 1879 – 18 August 1879
Monarch	Isma'il Pasha
Preceded by	Tewfik Pasha
Succeeded by	Tewfik Pasha
In office 14 September 1881 – 4 February 1882
Monarch	Tewfik Pasha
Preceded by	Riaz Pasha
Succeeded by	Mahmoud Samy el-Baroudy
In office 21 August 1882 – 7 January 1884
Monarch	Tewfik Pasha
Preceded by	Isma'il Raghib Pasha
Succeeded by	Nubar Pasha
Personal details
Born	February 1826 Kavala, Ottoman Empire
Died	20 April 1887 (aged 61) Graz, Austria-Hungary
Parent(s)	Muhammad Said, Kadi of Mecca

Mohamed Sherif Pasha GCSI (1826–1887) (Template:Lang-ar) was an Egyptian statesman of Turkish origin. He served as Prime Minister of Egypt three times during his career. His first term was between April 7, 1879 and August 18, 1879. His second term was served from September 14, 1881 to February 4, 1882. His final term was served between August 21, 1882 and January 7, 1884.

Biography

Sherif, who was from Kavala in the Ottoman Empire (now in northern Greece), filled numerous administrative posts under Sa'id Pasha and Isma'il Pasha. He was better educated than most of his contemporaries, and had married a daughter of Colonel Sèves, the French non-commissioned officer who became Suleiman Pasha under Mehmet Ali. They were the maternal grandparents of Queen consort Nazli of Egypt and Regent Sherif Sabri Pasha

As minister of foreign affairs he was useful to Ismail, who used Sherif's bluff bonhomie to veil many of his most insidious proposals. Of singularly lazy disposition, he yet possessed considerable tact; he was in fact an Egyptian Lord Melbourne, whose policy was to leave everything alone.

Sherif's favorite argument against any reform was to appeal to the Pyramids as an immutable proof of the solidity of Egypt financially and politically. His fatal optimism rendered him largely responsible for the collapse of Egyptian credit which brought about the fall of Ismail.

Upon the military insurrection of September 1881 under Urabi Pasha, Sherif was summoned by the khedive Tawfiq to form a new ministry. The impossibility of reconciling the financial requirements of the national party with the demands of the British and French controllers of the public debt, compelled him to resign in the following February.

After the suppression of the Urabi Revolt he was again installed in office (August 1882) by Tawfiq, but in January 1884 he resigned rather than sanction the evacuation of the Sudan. As to the strength of the Mahdist movement he had then no conception. When urged by Sir Evelyn Baring (Lord Cromer) early in 1883 to abandon some of the more distant parts of the Sudan, he replied with characteristic light-heartedness: "Nous en causerons plus tard ; d'abord nous allons donner une bonne raclée à ce monsieur" (We'll talk about that later, first we're going to give this gentleman (i.e. the Mahdi) a good thrashing). Hicks Pasha's expedition was at the time preparing to march on El Obeid.

Many of sherif pashas descendent’s are considered the highest ranking individuals in egyptian high society, due to being the oldest money in the Middle East; along with the rest of egypt’s turco-albanian aristocracy. Those families are the families which arrived in egypt with Mohamed Ali pacha between 1800-1810 and were also pacha’s and bey’s of European ancestry. They adopted extremely western lifestyles and were and are considered the ideals of beauty as they have western features. Many of the egyptian aristocracy viewed the commoners as “balady” barbaric and backwards. And viewed the rest of the arab nobility and royalty across the Middle East as nouveau riche and savage because of their Bedouin ancestry. The egyptian aristocrats spoke French and Turkish far more than Arabic, and many are described as having a broken egyptian dialect compared to the rest of the population. Egypts European elite owned thousands of acres of the finest cotton plantations in the world which were in egypt, far better quality than the American ones. Like the Americans they had imported thousands of African slaves as well as Arab ones to work on these plantations. They had Turkish slaves as well but those worked in the palaces, as higher ranking members of staff. there were many Turks in egypt only the highest ranking members (aayan of Cairo) the pashas and beys, were members of the aristocracy, while the “aayan” of the country side, who were also pashas and beys, but did not come with Mohamed Ali pacha were considered nobility and ranked lower than the aristocracy although still very high, compared to the nobility in the Middle East. Chaos erupted in egypt when in the opening of parliament the highest ranking women of egypt’s aristocracy, who were personally invited by king farouk, had entered in rolls royces and wore fox fur coats ordered from the most expensive couture houses in Paris, as well as the Turkish yashmak ( a white half Veil around the neck) while the egyptian mass was dying of famine in the country side. The elite owned most of the land available in the country although they were less than 1 percent of the population. They were the richest aristocracy in the world while the egyptian commoners were the poorest in the world, this was one of the factors leading to the end of the monarchy in egypt.

Sherif died in Graz, Austria-Hungary, on April 20, 1887.