The decision to leave Cairo wasn’t one Sanaa Seif made lightly, despite the long stretches in prison, vicious beatings and threats of worse to come from Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s repressive regime. For the 28-year-old pro-democracy activist, going into exile didn’t only involve saying goodbye to home, friends and family. It meant leaving the country where her brother, Alaa Abd El-Fattah, is jailed and on hunger strike.
“It took a lot of contemplation,” she says, sitting at the kitchen table of her temporary London home and reflecting on her most recent time in prison. “I had time to think – this was my third stretch inside.” During exercise breaks, there was a tree in the courtyard under which she would sit and consider her options. Opposite were the cells where those facing a death sentence were detained. “I had to accept that could be my future,” says Seif. “That’s what the authorities threatened. Maybe I’m naive not to have realised it earlier, but Cairo was never going to be safe again.”
