Al-Ahram Weekly Issue No. 250 7 - 13 December 1995
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875

Day of choice

photo: Abdel-Wahab El-Seheiti

Egyptians returned to the polls yesterday in a second round of voting, to decide the fate of 306 People's Assembly seats, amid scattered violence, opposition charges of fraud and harassment and government assertions of fair play. Of the seats where the 29 November election had produced decisive results, the ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) scored a landslide victory, but the fate of about two thirds of the Assembly's 444 seats remained undetermined because their contestants failed to gain a simple, but decisive, majority. The election's final results will be declared this evening or Friday morning, according to sources at the Ministry of the Interior.

Vying for the 306 seats in 174 constituencies were 612 candidates - the two highest vote-winners in each district. They included 255 from the NDP, 14 from the Wafd, nine from the Islamist-oriented Labour Party, seven from the leftist Tagammu, five Nasserists, two Liberals and as many as 320 independents. Many of the later were NDP supporters, but they also included about 20 members of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

In the first round the NDP won 124 seats, around 90 per cent of those which were won outright, 14 others went to independents. Opposition parties and the Brotherhood failed to win a single seat.

While the government said that about 50 per cent of the nation's 20 million registered voters had cast ballots in the first round, the turnout yesterday appeared to be lower.

The government went ahead with yesterday's ballot despite administrative court orders that first-round results in about 50 constituencies - out of the nation's 222 - were null and void because of vote-rigging and other irregularities. But the government contested the orders before the Supreme Administrative Court. The government lawyer, Gamal El-Labban, claimed that his appeal meant the suspension of the initial court ruling.

As in the first round, which claimed the lives of 17 people, scattered incidents of violence were reported and the opposition alleged foul play and harassment.

But Information Minister Safwat El-Sherif insisted that "all government authorities showed complete neutrality. The elections were absolutely free." He added that, "Egypt does not accept any intervention in its domestic affairs."

Prominent figures running in the second round included Ahmed Gweili, minister of supply, Mohamed Ali Mahgoub, minister of Al-Awqaf (religious endowments), Khaled Mohieddin, leader of the Tagammu Party, and Diaeddin Dawoud, leader of the Democratic Nasserist Party.

The Cairo constituency of Helwan was the scene of a major confrontation between the supporters of Mahgoub and his rival, the Liberal party's Mustafa Bakri, which ended in the latter's withdrawal from the election race.

Bakri, who edits the party's mouthpiece, Al-Ahrar, charged that Mahgoub's henchmen had stuffed the ballot boxes with votes for the minister, that his representatives were barred from the polling stations and his supporters prevented from voting. Bakri had brought in supporters from his Upper Egyptian home town, armed with heavy sticks.

Two truckloads of Bakri supporters, armed with knives and chains, were arrested, Mahgoub's brother, Ismail, was also apprehended for bringing in a microbus loaded with heavy sticks and chains, Interior Ministry sources said.

Diaeddin Dawoud, running in the northeastern Nile Delta town of Fareskour, was greeted by hundreds of local residents, pledging their support, when he arrive at a local school used as a polling station. Dawoud, who was opposed by independent Mohamed Khalil Qweita, said he did not feel the security forces were biased, and that his failure to clinch a decisive victory in the first round was the result of the split in the vote among the numerous candidates. Some people had not bothered to vote, he continued, "because they were over-confident. They stayed away from the polls because they believed that I was going to win anyway."

A judge, who was supervising the polling, said "voting is continuing calmly. We are intent on a fair election".

In Damietta city, Ahmed Salama, a candidate of the Islamist-oriented Labour Party, was running against the NDP's Yasser El-Deeb. A Salama representative alleged: "All polling stations in the town are being cordoned off by police and Salama's poll-watchers were taken to the police station. The battle has been clinched in favour of the NDP."

In the constituency of Baltim-Hamoul in the extreme north of the Nile Delta, poll-watchers for Nasserist Hamdin El-Sabahi said they were prevented from entering the polling stations. El-Sabahi alleged that 124 out of his 148 representatives were bared in Hamoul, whereas representatives of his opponent, independent Ali Hassan, were inside the stations before the official 8am opening time. "Vote-rigging is taking place openly in the full view of the police," charged El-Sabahi, who vowed to take up the matter with the judicial supervisors.

In the Qalyubia constituency of Kafr Shukr, just north of Cairo, where Tagammu leader Khaled Mohieddin was running, police cars patrolled the streets as voting progressed peacefully. But journalists who visited Mit Al-Sebai, hometown of Mohieddin's opponent, independent Ahmed Seif, found the streets littered with broken glass and stones. Trees and the surrounding fields were burning. A large number of General Security forces personnel were inside the village. Journalists were told that Seif's supporters had pelted the police with stones and bottles because they had prevented them from voting.

Asked about his rival's claim that the first round election had been rigged in his favour, Mohieddin responded: "This is an old story that is told in every election".

In Alexandria, independent Adel Eid, who was opposed by the NDP's Farouk Rakha in the Bab Sharqi constituency, complained that his poll watchers were prevented from entering two polling stations out of six.

At Mina Al-Bassal, another Alexandria constituency, six truckloads of security forces were positioned outside the principal polling station. The turnout was low and only registered voters were allowed inside. But the turnout was heavy at another polling station, where 500 supporters of independent candidate Rashad Osman had gathered. The supporters apparently hailed from Osman's hometown of Sohag in Upper Egypt, and were armed with heavy sticks.

At Karmouz, a third Alexandria constituency, Tagammu candidate Abul-Ezz El-Hariri charged that his poll-monitors were prevented from entering five polling stations. Three truckloads of security forces took up positions in the area.

Alleging that the police had rounded up Osman's and Hariri's poll watchers, about 1,000 Hariri supporters demonstrated. Police used tear gas to disperse the crowd.

In the Cairo constituency of Bab Al-Sha'riya, where Wafdist Ayman Nour was running, the polling stations opened at 9 AM, one hour behind schedule. Nour's wife, who was watching the vote, alleged that rigging was in progress.

Nour, who was slightly injured by a gun-shot fired by an unidentified assailant the day before, arrived at the scene in the late afternoon, following his discharge from hospital. "I am not accusing anyone," he said.

At the Cairo constituency of Matariya-Ain Shams, Moukhtar Nouh, treasurer of the Bar Association, and the only prominent Muslim Brotherhood figure still in the race, was running against the NDP's Mohamed Farouq. Nouh charged that his representatives had been barred from the polling stations, two were beaten up and two others arrested.

"We have documented cases of vote-rigging," Nouh said. "Our representatives were not allowed to open the ballot boxes before the voting started, to make sure that they were empty." But a security source denied Nouh's allegations, saying the boxes had been opened in the presence of Nouh's representatives. The source insisted that none of Nouh's representatives was attacked or arrested.

Nonetheless, after the ballot closed at 5pm, Brotherhood spokesman Maamoun El-Hodeibi told the Weekly that several Islamist candidates had declared their withdrawal from the elections. "It is a symbolic gesture, for the candidates can do nothing. It has been a vicious process."

At the downtown constituency of Qasr Al-Nil in Cairo, where Wafdist Yassin Serageddin and Hossam Badrawi, an independent doctor and businessman, fought a fierce battle, voting was smooth but the turnout was meagre. Both candidates were met by cheering crowds.

Police officers and station chiefs were relaxed, declaring that "this is a very clean constituency with little, if any, trouble". Serageddin said that he was satisfied "so far", and that the police were successfully maintaining control.

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