THERE WERE white-suited policemen but no lines of voters outside the arts academy in the leafy, upscale Zamalek district of Cairo yesterday. A steady trickle of middle-aged and elderly men and women flowed in through the gate and made for polling rooms, flourishing their identity cards and collecting ballots, printed with the names, photos and symbols of the two candidates contesting the presidential run-off.
The choice was between the bearded face of Muslim Brother Mohamed Morsy, symbolised by the scales of justice, and clean-shaven former air force commander Ahmed Shafik, his visage stern, his symbol a ladder. Zamalek is, reluctantly, largely Shafik territory.
Amr Shaarawi explained why there was little enthusiasm and turnout was low: “During the first round we preferred anyone but these two.”
While he did not like the choice he was forced to make, he approved of the dissolution of the lower house of the legislature, effected by the military following last week’s ruling by the constitutional court. “A new parliamentary election should produce a more balanced assembly,” he said.
The Muslim Brotherhood and the ultra-conservative Noor party held 70 per cent of the seats in the dismissed assembly. Many secular voters in Zamalek and elsewhere agreed with him. They fear the Brotherhood could transform Egypt into an “Islamic state”.
In the shadow of the pyramids at Giza, the walls of crumbling buildings in the narrow, sandy alleyways are plastered with Morsy posters. This is a Brotherhood stronghold. The guardians of the gate at the Nassar preparatory school were less than welcoming when Irish Ambassador Isolde Moylan and I turned up. They permitted us to glimpse cloaked women lined up in the courtyard.
We were greeted in friendly fashion at the nearby Mubarak school and ushered into a polling station where Ayman Maimony of the Egyptian Human Rights Society was monitoring proceedings. He introduced us to two pairs of observers from the Morsy and Shafik camps. All four women wore headscarves.
Although voters were not supposed to discuss their choice before or after they cast ballots, as we left the school a pretty young woman in a headscarf and yellow dress told us she did not like either candidate. Those who felt strongly had discs they could stick to their ballot nullifying their votes.
Omar, a young, bearded Muslim Brother, had stationed himself across the street from the school and was counting voters as they entered, making certain that the election commission’s tally matches his. The Brotherhood is putting together a database in case it decides to challenge the result.
At the Helmiya school, we just missed a shouting match between Morsy and Shafik supporters but voting was orderly and peaceful inside. Turnout was modest. The refrain at every polling station we visited was, “People will come in the evening when it is not so hot.”
The temperature soared to a stunning 44 degrees during the afternoon but the claim of late voters seems to have been a myth. Both local analysts and foreign diplomats said participation fell below the 46 per cent that voted in the first round on May 23rd-24th. A low turnout could deprive the winner of credibility and consequence.
Conspiracy-minded Egyptians have been concocting recipes to reveal how the presidential election has been cooked and many are convinced that Mr Shafik, the military’s man, will be the winner. Results are expected early today but the official outcome will not be announced until Thursday.
Whoever wins, political commentator Mona Anis said, “There will be no revolutionary fallout”, no fresh uprising in Cairo’s Tahrir Square or in Egypt’s other main cities.
But, she observed, “I don’t see that everything is lost . . . We have achieved some political reforms. We have a president [Hosni Mubarak] in prison with a life sentence . . . We are still in transition and it could take a couple of years before the situation gets better.”
