Voting begins in Egypt's presidential run-offs | Egypt Independent
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Voting begins in Egypt's presidential run-offs
Polling stations have opened ahead of the first day of voting in the presidential elections' run-offs. The run-offs are held between the Muslim Brotherhood's Mohamed Morsy and former Prime Minister Ahmad Shafiq. Both candidates have made it to the final round of elections after they secured 5,764,952 and 5,505,327 votes respecitvely in the first round held in May. 46 percent of eligible voters cast their ballot in the first round of elections. The run-offs are taking place in some 13,101 polling stations nation wide. The elections are supervised by 14,509 judges, with the help of employees from the Ministry of Justice. Vote counting is expected to begin on Monday and the final results are expected to be announced on Thursday.
Egypt Independent provides live updates throughout the day.
9:30 am: In the affluent area of Garden City, in central Cairo, some 150 voters queued before a polling station. They were mostly old men and women. An international monitor told Egypt Independent that the polling station opened on time. "It was a bit messy inside the classroom. They could have done better," said Cassim Uteem, head of mission of the Electoral Institute for Sustainable Democracy in Africa, the monitoring group. He added that they are are now allowed to spend more than 30 minutes in a polling station, which was previously the time limit for a monitor in one place.
Manal Gouda, 47, a lawyer covered in niqab, was planning to vote for Morsy. But she wasn't allowed to vote because she only had a passport and not a national ID, which she said she lost. "I was allowed to vote for Morsy using my passport iin the first round, but the judge refused this time." Sawsan, 72, a political science professor, also planned to vote for Morsy. "He is the candidate of the civil state. We don't want someone who represents the military anymore." In the first round, she voted for the moderate Islamist candidate Abdel Moneim Abouel Fottouh. Meanwhile, Kamal Eddine Khateeb, 76, is voting for Shafiq. "We want someone who can restore stability and who won't create religion-based identity differences," he said.
9:00 am: Polling stations have opened for voters across the nation. Short queues of voters are reported in various areas. Voting has been encouraged by the state which declared both voting days, Saturday and Sunday, a day off. Meanwhile, some delyas in opening polling stations before voters have been reported. According to Al-Masry Al-Youm, some polling stations in the Bassateen area, south of Cairo, haven't opened yet since supervising judges and employees haven't arrived yet. Similarly, some polling stations in Mansha'at Radwan in Giza didn't open to the public yet, due to a delay in the arrival of voters' lists.
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