Egypt: Sisi prepares for victory in low turnout presidential vote
Local Editor
Former army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is expected to emerge from a second and final day of voting on Tuesday as Egypt’s next head of state, returning the presidency to a military man as hopes for democracy fade three years after Hosni Mubarak’s downfall.
Seeking to boost turnout that appeared low on the first day of voting, the government declared Tuesday a holiday and extended voting by an hour so that polls would close at 10:00 pm (1900 GMT). The central bank also declared a bank holiday.
With victory for Sisi a foregone conclusion, the turnout is seen as crucial to shoring up the legitimacy of the field marshal who toppled Egypt’s first freely elected head of state, the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Mursi last July.
The limited showing contrasted with parliamentary and presidential elections held after Mubarak’s overthrow, when voter lines were measured in the hundreds and stretched far into the streets leading to the polling stations.
Sisi himself had called for a record turnout. But millions appear to be adhering to calls to boycott the vote.
Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood movement is boycotting the vote, as are revolutionary youth groups including the leftist April 6 youth movement, which spearheaded the anti-Mubarak revolt and whose leader and several members have been jailed.
Sisi enjoys backing from Egyptians worn down by three years of turmoil since Mubarak’s downfall in 2011. While the Islamists demonize him as the mastermind of a coup, his backers see him as a hero for toppling Mursi after mass protests against his rule.
Polling stations were guarded by soldiers, some in black face masks, with plain clothes police also in evidence.
Sisi faces only one challenger: the leftist politician Hamdeen Sabahi, who came third in the 2012 election won by Mursi. Other candidates who contested the election won by Mursi did not run, saying the climate was not conducive to democracy following a crackdown on Islamist and other opposition groups.
(Reuters, AFP)
