Voters trickled into polling stations in three Giza constituencies on Wednesday as reruns of Egypt’s parliamentary elections got underway, with low turnout, disappearing queues, and visible attempts to buy and mobilize votes that the National Election Authority/NEA said it was investigating.
The new round of voting comes after the Higher Administrative Court annulled the results in 30 constituencies in the first phase of the House of Representatives elections following challenges to the integrity of the vote and reports of violations. Reruns are being held on Wednesday and Thursday.
Regarding the NEA’s decisions in the second phase, the Higher Administrative Court on Wednesday issued 266 rulings on appeals, mostly upholding the announced results. It rejected 211 challenges, referred 37 to the Court of Cassation for lack of jurisdiction and dismissed eight on admissibility grounds, meaning no constituencies in the second phase were stripped of their results despite reported violations.
In Giza’s Talbiya and Omraniya, Dokki and Giza, and Boulaq al-Dakrour constituencies, Al Manassa observed taxis transporting voters to polling stations and waiting until they cast their ballots, while the long, choreographed queues of young men and women seen in the first round were nowhere to be found.
Vote buying and fake queues in Talbiya
Polling stations at Ahmed Orabi Secondary School and Mostafa Kamel School in Talbiya were almost deserted for much of the day, with only small numbers of women and older voters arriving in taxis that parked and waited outside until their passengers finished voting.
Mohamed El-Tarifi, who owns a clothing shop opposite Ahmed Orabi School, said the taxis belong to the campaign of candidate Sayed Zaghloul. The Higher Administrative Court had ruled in favor of Zaghloul’s appeal, cancelling the result of the first round in the constituency, where a runoff had been scheduled between four candidates not including him.
El-Tarifi told Al Manassa that, after voting, the taxis take people to a large campaign headquarters affiliated with Zaghloul on Mostashfa Al Sadr Street, near Omraniya police station, where each voter is given 200 Egyptian pounds ($4) in exchange for their vote.
In his appeal, Zaghloul argued that the earlier vote in the district saw irregularities in the aggregation of totals from the ballot boxes, tampering and forgery in the records of the general committees and subcommittees, and the offering of electoral bribes and in-kind gifts to voters in order to influence their will and steer their choices.
According to El-Tarifi, vote buying in the constituency is not limited to Zaghloul. He said independent candidate Gergis Lawendy has tasked a number of shop owners near Mostafa Kamel School with collecting the national ID cards of people they know and pushing them to vote for him, also for 200 pounds. He said money was being distributed to women voters after they cast their ballots inside a women’s hair salon opposite Ahmed Orabi School.
At the Martyr Hisham Sheta Girls Preparatory School polling station on Haram Street, turnout was very low. Even so, a police officer who identified himself as an officer with the public relations department of Giza Security Directorate refused to allow an Al Manassa journalist to film or even remain in the vicinity of the school.
Outside the school, there was a small manufactured queue of young men, mirrored on the other side of the gate by a similar queue of women sitting on the ground, without the usual flow of voters entering and exiting the polling station inside the school.
NEA investigating
Judge Ahmed Bendary, executive director of the NEA, said the authority’s operations room had detected through social media reports of mobilization points in several streets in Talbiya district in Giza, where votes were being bought.
During a press conference on Wednesday to monitor the electoral process, Bendary said he had instructed Sherif El-Oqbi, head of the NEA’s follow-up committee in Giza governorate, to take the necessary measures regarding what was recorded and to coordinate with security agencies. He said El-Oqbi had confirmed that they were working to end violations in coordination with the security directorate and the criminal investigation department.
The Interior Ministry said it had arrested several people in constituencies where voting is taking place, including Talbiya, 6 October City, and Haram in Giza, on charges related to electoral bribes and illegal campaigning.
In Dokki and Giza, half an hour without a single voter
In Dokki and Giza constituency, the absence of voters outside polling stations was striking, and the long queues that had been a defining feature of the first round in the district had disappeared.
Outside Badr School on Iran Street in Dokki, the large tent that had stood there during the first round was gone, and during a half-hour period in which Al Manassa observed the station, no voter was seen entering the polling place. A similar scene played out at Orman Girls Secondary School in Dokki, where no voters appeared while a small group of people sat near the school wearing badges with the name of candidate Kamal El-Daly.
At the polling station set up at the headquarters of the General Authority for Reconstruction and Agricultural Development Projects, the picture was much the same. The artificial queues had disappeared, and there were no voters in front of the station.
In Boulaq El-Dakrour constituency, turnout was limited when polls opened at 9am, with women and older voters dominating the scene outside Sheikha Gawaher School, which hosts 16 subcommittees.
Turnout increased gradually towards midday, coinciding with the arrival of microbuses bearing stickers in the colors of the Egyptian flag and the slogan “Go participate,” along with white sheets of paper printed with the voters’ committee numbers.
A four-wheel-drive vehicle carrying a picture of President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and loudspeakers circled the area around the school. Nearby, a small procession of fewer than 20 people marched with drums and pipes, carrying Egyptian flags.
Campaign materials for individual candidates were notably absent directly in front of polling station entrances, while candidate banners were heavily present a few dozen meters away.
Tighter controls inside polling stations
Inside the polling center, the atmosphere was calmer than in the first round. The clusters of candidate supporters that had packed the area during the annulled vote were gone. One candidate shouted at an agent for a rival candidate, saying, “Any guidance will be filmed,” in reference to attempts to direct voters inside the station.
Police prevented some candidate agents from entering the polling stations, even though they held powers of attorney, because they did not carry identification cards issued by the NEA.
Across the 30 constituencies where the reruns are being held, 623 candidates are competing for 58 seats in the House of Representatives. This figure does not include six seats that have already been decided in four constituencies—Giza in Giza governorate, Montaza in Alexandria, Mahmoudiya in Beheira and Aswan First in Aswan governorate—whose fate remains pending before the Court of Cassation.
The first phase of the parliamentary elections, before the results in 68.5% of its districts were cancelled by decisions of the Higher Administrative Court and the NEA, was marred by violations and irregularities, including vote buying, steering of voters, and the failure to send the count from some polling stations.
