Popular Egyptian TV host Amr Adib known for presenting controversial topics across different TV platforms is taking Mohamed Ramadan, an acclaimed actor and singer to court on Dec 20. Adib filed a lawsuit against Ramadan with four charges held against the actor including misuse of social media as well as slander and defamation.
Other than being two of the biggest public figures in Egypt with Ramadan amassing more than 20 million followers on Instagram, both celebrities have a reputation of being quite controversial and outspoken especially Ramadan whose speedy rise to fame coupled with his shocking social media posts have been generating quite the stir within the public eye. Their upcoming court case is part of an ongoing spat between the two celebrities that began three years ago and involved the late pilot Ashraf Abou El Yusr.
Back in Oct 2019, during one of his private trips, Ramadan took a picture of himself sitting at the cockpit next to El Yusr and shared it all over social media. The issue stemmed from the fact that around the world several airlines prohibit having any passenger sit in the cockpit and because of this, the authorities have officially banned El Yusr from flying, ending his career as a pilot.
El Yusr took action by filing a lawsuit against Ramadan back in April 2021 were the Cairo Economic court awarded the pilot 6 million Egyptian pounds as compensation. What followed was the unexpected death of El Yusr just 20 days after the court case. That is when Amr Adib expressed his frustration towards Ramadan and accused him of being responsible for the poor health of the late pilot that resulted from the struggles he faced after losing his job.
From there, the two began their continuous series of back and forth disputes with their biggest clash resulting from a video that Ramadan released. In the video, we see the singer laying on a pool float, throwing money in the water and since its release, it generated quite the stir all over social media. In response, Amr Adib took the pool video as an opportunity to express his frustration with the artist during one of the live broadcasts of his popular show “The Story With Amr Adib”:
During the broadcast, in a moment of heated exasperation, Adib said that Ramadan’s video expressed a very clear message that money is of no concern to the singer and if that is truly the case, then it should not have been an issue for Ramadan to have paid the full law suit compensation sum of 25 million EGP that El Yusr requested during the court proceedings. From there, Adib directed a message to Ramadan calling on him to, “calm down, be reasonable, stop showing off and being arrogant”.
Ramadan took to social media to fire back at Adib by posting a video on his Instagram account depicting a scene from his show “Eagle of Upper Egypt”. In the clip, we see Ramadan having a heated discussion with another character. In the background, we can hear Adib’s voice reprimanding the singer, calling him arrogant so in response, Ramadan’s character slaps a random person passing by and shouts “Why don’t you mind your own business?” To Ramadan, the random character in the scene represents Adib. This video offended Adib to a large extent and made him use his talk show to send another message to the actor:
In the broadcast, Adib blatantly stated that he asked his lawyer to file a lawsuit against Ramadan and any money he will receive in compensation during court hearings will be donated to a children’s hospital in Egypt. He then ended the show by saying to Ramadan that “if no one has raised you, then I will know how to raise you”.
That was how their very first court case came to be where Ramadan was the one who filed a lawsuit against Adib back in Dec 2021. During court proceedings, the singer made two charges against Adib of insult and slander and requested a compensation of 10,000 EGP. Based on Ramadan’s lawsuit, it was stated that Adib took advantage of his job and used his media platform to defame and undermine the reputation of the singer. At the end of the court hearings, Adib was acquitted of all charges and the court ruled that the talk show host did not violate the media code of honor and that any reference that was made to Ramadan in Adib’s show was considered permissible criticism.
Today, one year later, the two artists are again bringing their long-lived dispute to the court. It is hard to know whether this will be the final time the two celebrities will go head to head in a legal setting and whether they will also continue their dispute outside the court, with Adib using his talk show to criticize Ramadan’s behavior while Ramadan relies on social media to fire back at Adib.
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