Noticias

Egyptian presidential contender Hamdeen Sabahi -- who faces a Herculean challenge against former army chief Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi -- has stated that he wouldl not withdraw from the elections despite the doubts cast on its credibility by a surprise measure by the country's electoral commission to add a third day to the voting process.

Low voter turnout has been reported on the second and final day of Egyptian presidential elections, as former army chief Abdel Fattah el-Sisi is expected to emerge as the country's next president.

While the Egyptian government declared a national holiday for Tuesday in an effort to get voters to cast their ballots, an official with international monitoring group Global Network for Rights and Development reported that voter turnout was noticibly low.

15:10 A cabinet spokesman said the government cannot interfere in the work of the Presidential Elections Commission (PEC) in response to widespread media calls to allow voters to cast their ballots without residence restrictions.

"PEC is the sole body responsible for making any election-related decisions. It has its own regulations and rules, and we cannot interfere."

Millions of voters are casting ballots across Egypt to choose a new president, for the second time in two years.

A huge security operation has been mounted by police and the military, amid fear of attacks by militants seeking to disrupt the polls.

Former army chief Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, who deposed Islamist President Mohammed Morsi last year, is standing against left-wing candidate Hamdeen Sabahi.

Mr Sisi is forecast to win by a comfortable margin.

Egyptians cast ballots Monday for a new president in an election widely expected to secure a resounding victory for military strongman Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, one that will likely further entrench the army’s decades-long rule over the country.

Monday marked the first of two days of voting in which just two candidates, including former defense minister Sissi and leftist politician Hamdeen Sabbahi, are vying for the nation’s top office after Egypt’s first democratically elected president was ousted by the military last year.

Democratic legitimacy has been a difficult topic of conversation in Egypt following the overthrow of Mohammed Morsi’s government on July 3, 2013, by current presidential hopeful and former Defense Minister Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. Yet, as Egyptians pour into polling centers across the country on May 26 to vote for the sixth time in a political process since the 2011 revolution, what democratic legitimacy means, particularly in elections, will define state-society relations for years to come.

Egyptians are voting on Monday and Tuesday in elections to choose a new president after the military's ouster last year of the country's first democratically elected leader, the Islamist Mohammed Morsi.

Considered all but certain to win is the man who removed Morsi — retired military chief Field Marshal Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who for the past 10 months has been the most powerful figure in Egypt. The only other candidate in the race is leftist politician Hamdeen Sabahi, who finished third in the 2012 presidential election.

Egyptian Interim President Adly Mansour is scheduled to give a televised speech Sunday ahead of the country's presidential elections, state-owned media agency MENA reported.

Mansour was head of Egypt's High Constitutional Court before taking up the interim presidency following the ouster of Mohamed Morsi on 3 July 2013.

Egyptians are expected to cast their ballots across the country Monday and Tuesday, fulfiling the next steps in the political roadmap announced by then-Defence Minister Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi on Morsi's removal.

To say that the challenges facing Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's likely presidency look insurmountable is a huge understatement. As the next president, Sisi will have to contend with a sluggish economy, an energy crisis, a water crisis, vanishing tourism and foreign currency reserves, political instability and political violence. All the while, he will have to deal with voter expectations like those US President Barack Obama faced in 2008, and a potentially fatal backlash if he doesn’t deliver on them.