Egypt entered its second day of presidential elections with the Egypt's National Elections Authority declaring on Monday ‘massive’ turnout in the first 24 hours. Voting rates in North Sinai ballots ranged from high to low.
The three-day presidential race sees two chief candidates, one being the incumbent President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and the other being Ghad Party leader Mousa Mustafa Mousa. Sisi is expected to score a landslide win, propping himself for a second term.
Some 60 million citizens are eligible to vote in Egypt.
Over 12,000 poll stations and NEA committees have opened doors for voters in various Egyptian governorates to cast their votes from early morning.
NEA Spokesperson Mahmoud al-Sharif said that “the operating room established by the Commission monitored the heavy voter turnout, specifically in the governorates of Cairo, Giza, Alexandria, Qaliubiya, Asyut and Aswan.”
He added during a Monday press conference that “most sub-polling committees in all governorates started work on schedule, except for 12 polling stations who were delayed for 30 minutes for various reasons.”
Polls closed at 9 p.m. (1900 GMT), with official media hammering the message that voting was a national duty to foil the country’s enemies.
Early morning, Sisi cast his vote at his election committee headquarters in a school in Heliopolis. As soon as he cast his vote, Sisi inspected the electoral process from the campaign operations room for his candidacy.
This is the first time Sisi has visited his campaign headquarters, and the campaign has never announced similar activity since it started two months ago.
On the other hand, presidential candidate Mousa voted in Abdin, central Cairo, and said in following statements that he hoped that over 30 million voters partake in the national elections.
“The Egyptian state is in dire need of popular participation in support of the democratic process,” he said.
Prime Minister Sherif Ismail said that “the first day of the presidential elections passed regularly and without problems, according to a follow-up report in a video conference for a number of monitoring committees in different governorates.”
He said that “the NEA has been regularly filled in on any obstacle arising and that may impair the voting process.”
He called on Egyptians to participate in the elections to exercise their national right and to highlight Egypt as a developed country where citizens know and practice their rights.
In the province of North Sinai, turnout rates varied in different centers.
