Heightened security as Egypt awaits election result

[DJKeefy]

Security forces deployed at key sites prior to Thursday's presidential election result announcement.

Extra security forces are being deployed across Egypt before presidential election results are officially announced on Thursday.

Three thousand police and soldiers are being sent to protect vital political and economic sites, including the Suez Canal, head of security in Suez, Adel Refaat, said Wednesday.

"We will firmly defend all public institutions and police stations," said Refaat.

The Muslim Brotherhood's Mohamed Mursi and Mubarak's last premier Ahmed Shafiq both claimed victory after the 16-17 June presidential election runoff.

A military build-up has also been seen on the Cairo-Alexandria Road in scenes reminiscent of the 18-day uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak from power.

Muslim Brotherhood spokesperson Mohamed Ghozlan warned of a "dangerous faceoff" between the people and the army if Ahmed Shafiq, described by opponents as the "military's man," is declared Egypt's new president.

A Shafiq victory would be "a direct military coup by the military council," Ghozlan added.

The Islamist candidate's campaign maintain that their man, Mursi, won the elections with 52 per cent of the vote. Shafiq's campaign, however, dismissed such claims on Tuesday, stating that their candidate was in the lead with 51 per cent of the vote.

In a press conference on Wednesday afternoon, Judges for Egypt, a group of Egyptian reformist judges who helped monitor the recently-concluded runoffs, announced Mursi's victory with 13,238,335 votes against 12,351,310 for military man Shafiq.

Source: http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/45696.aspx

[Horus]

This is what happens when apathy sets in, it allows certain people to get into power by default. The average Egyptian probably didn't want either candidate as both were at extremes of the political spectrum, so they don't bother to vote for any of them. Alternatively, opinions are so divided that regardless of who wins 50% of the voters will feel cheated, in countries like Egypt you need at least 80% of people voting for the winner to keep stability. As it is now regardless of who comes out on top there will still be problems, if Shafiq is declared the winner then the army will almost certainly have to come down hard on the MB or even have to outlaw it again to restore order. Either way the genii is out of the bottle and Egypt will never be the same again.