Obscure politician offers token challenge in election
CAIRO — A little known Egyptian politician who heads a party without a single seat in parliament submitted his candidacy documents to the election commission on Monday, becoming a last-minute challenger to President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi.
El-Sissi is virtually certain of winning a second, four-year term in the March 26-28 vote. But after a string of would-be challengers were arrested, forced out or quit the race, the prospect of a one-candidate election has proved embarrassing for the government.
Pro-government media and public figures loyal to el-Sissi had pressured one of Egypt’s oldest political parties, the Wafd, to field a candidate. But after two days of marathon deliberations, the party decided Saturday not to field a candidate and instead to renew its support for a second term for the president.
Moussa Mustafa Moussa of the Ghad, or Tomorrow, party, was the subject of intense speculation over the weekend, with many predicting he would step forward as a face-saving candidate. On Monday — the deadline for submitting candidacy documents — one of his top aides submitted the papers to the election commission on his behalf.
Would-be challengers who are no longer in the race include a former prime minister, a former military chief of staff, a prominent rights lawyer and a former lawmaker. They were unlikely to win the race, but their participation would have attracted protest votes against el-Sissi, including from Egyptians hit hard by the president’s austerity measures and other economic reforms.
“We supported President Abdel-Fattah elSissi against his challengers, but, of course, we saw fit to enter the race after everyone pulled out and the president was left alone,” Moussa told CBC, a private, pro-government television network. He said he has the support of more than 20 elected lawmakers.
The constitution stipulates that anyone wishing to run for president must have the support of at least 20 elected lawmakers or 25,000 “recommendations” from voters.
A previous leader of the Ghad Party, Ayman Nour, ran against Egypt’s long-ruling President Hosni Mubarak in 2005, in the country’s first multicandidate election. Nour lost by a huge margin amid widespread allegations of vote-rigging and was jailed in December of that year.
Nour had fired Moussa before he was jailed, but Moussa returned and defeated him in a leadership battle in 2011, the same year Mubarak was overthrown in a popular uprising. Nour is now a harsh critic of el-Sissi’s rule and lives in exile abroad.
El-Sissi led the 2013 ouster of a freely elected but divisive president, the Islamist Mohammed Morsi, and has since overseen what is perhaps the largest crackdown on dissent in the country’s living memory. Thousands of Morsi supporters have been jailed, along with secular activists. Most critics in the media have been silenced, human rights groups have been heavily restricted and scores of online news sites have been blocked.
Five opposition figures have called for a boycott of the vote, saying it has lost all credibility.