Egypt is receiving a flood of cash from its Gulf backers: $12.5bn was pledged at last month’s conference alone. Ratings agency Moody’s has edged Egypt’s sovereign rating one notch higher. But the country’s ailing economy still has a long way to go.

Since Egypt’s army strongman Abdel Fatah al-Sisi took power in July 2013, and assumed the presidency a year later, his key unswerving backers have been the Gulf monarchies of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE. (CONTINUED - 1599 WORDS)