Saturday, June 16, 2012

Egypt starts presidential election run-off

                               The Muslim Brotherhood's candidate Mohammed Mursi voted in Zagazig


Egyptians are voting in a two-day run-off election to choose their first freely elected president.
Mohammed Mursi, head of the Muslim Brotherhood's political wing, is up against Ahmed Shafiq, former President Hosni Mubarak's last prime minister.
The ruling generals have vowed to hand over power to the winner by 30 June.
But correspondents say there is less enthusiasm than there was for previous rounds of voting, and some have called for a boycott or spoiled ballots.
There were early queues outside some polling stations on Saturday, but later they were reduced in some places to just a steady trickle of voters, reports the BBC's Jon Leyne in Cairo.
Particularly noticeable is the lack of young people voting, our correspondent says.
They seem to be particularly disenchanted with the choice between Mr Shafiq, a candidate seen as a representative of the old regime, and the Islamist Mr Mursi, he adds.
While state TV has been urging people to vote, some activists have been distributing flyers in several Cairo metro stations calling for a boycott.
Mr Mursi's campaign held a news conference on Saturday afternoon in which it said several electoral violations had been reported, and urged voters to report any incidents.



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