Egypt braces for presidential run-off
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E-mail Xinhua, June 16, 2012
The Egyptians will go to the polls on Saturday in their presidential run-off between Muslim Brotherhood (MB)'s Mohamed Morsi and former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq, just two days after the newly-elected lower house of parliament was ruled unconstitutional and void by court.
"The second round will be full of suspense, with many recent changes in the political arena," said Fakhry al-Tahtawi, professor of political science at Cairo University.
The analyst said Morsi had exerted more efforts in the run-off electoral campaign to convince voters, because he knew the bad impression his group had made recently.
"Morsi worked hard to persuade the voters in the run-off, because his group committed many mistakes recently", he said.
Morsi took the lead in the first round with nearly 25 percent of the votes. But this number of votes was much lower compared with 45 percent of votes they got in the parliamentary polls earlier this year.
Relying on MB's powerful grassroots network, Morsi has also been backed by Salafist' Nour Party and defeated presidential candidate Aboul Fotouh. But leftist Hamdeen Sabahi, who ranked third in the first round, declined to support any of the two rivals in the run-off.
On June 2, ex-president Hosni Mubarak and former interior minister Habib al-Adli were sentenced to life imprisonment for failing to stop the killing of protestors. Mubarak's sons Alaa and Gamal, and Adli's six aids were acquitted, which sparked an outcry among key political powers.
"The verdicts of Mubarak and Adli are believed to affect the chance of Shafiq in the run-off negatively, as Shafiq resembles "a ghost of the former regime", political analyst Noha Bakr told Xinhua.
As a turning point, Egypt's Supreme Constitutional Court ruled Thursday unconstitutional the political isolation law and some articles of the parliamentary elections law.
The verdicts paved the way to Shafiq to continue in the presidential contest, while it led to the dissolution of the People's Assembly dominated by Islamists.
Ahmed Ban, political expert with Nile Center for Political and Strategic Studies, believed the ruling dealt a heavy blow to the MB.
"I think Shafiq seems to have more chance than Morsi now. The verdict may push some voters towards Shafiq, after his situation is supported by the constitutional," Ban said.
Shafiq, the last prime minister of the ex-president Hosni Mubarak era, came second in the first round polls with 5.5 million votes, or 23.3 percent. Coptic Christians, who account for about ten percent of the total population, Sufis, families of police and troops and some of supporters of defeated candidate Amr Moussa, are believed to endorse Shafiq.
The dissolution of the lower house of parliament might also serve to bring about some sympathy to the MB.
"We will vote for Morsi, because he is the only hope to rescue the revolution," Ahmed Maher, co-founder of the April 6 movement told Xinhua.
"I was intending to boycott, but after Thursday's verdicts that were for Shafiq and against the Muslim Brotherhood, I will vote for Morsi," said Amal Kamal, a youth activist.
Another analyst, Hoda Ragheb, said the sympathy did not touch many people, because the parliament's performance was too bad to make the people regret.
"I don't believe many people will sympathize with the Muslim Brotherhood, considering their shameful performance in the parliament, and after they lost their credibility in many political situations", she said.
Ragheb said no one can predict the results and that the ballots will have the final say.
The official results of the run-off will be officially announced on June 21. But the new president will face a country without a new constitution and parliament.
The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, which took over power in February 2011, has said it will transfer power by June 30.
Given the recent dissolution of the parliament, the ruling military council is expected to issue a supplementary constitutional declaration to make arrangements for the upcoming period.
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