CAIRO, 3 December 2005 — Egypt’s ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) is close to clinching the two-thirds parliamentary majority it needs to maintain control over the constitution, according to election results declared yesterday. The NDP, led by President Hosni Mubarak, won six seats outright in voting on Thursday. In at least 45 second-round run-offs next Wednesday both candidates are NDP.
With about 85 seats yet to be either announced or decided, that gives the NDP at least 277 of the 454 seats in Parliament, well within reach of the 303 it needs to exclude the opposition from important legislative decisions.
The opposition Muslim Brotherhood, which has taken the country by surprise with its strong showing, said it won no seats outright on Thursday but 35 of its 49 candidates had won a place in the run-offs between the top two candidates. The group, which fields candidates as independents because the government will not let it form a party, said the count was fixed so that no Brotherhood candidates won outright.
In the first two stages of the election 17 Brotherhood candidates took the 50 percent of the vote needed to win in the first round and avoid a run-off. The organization now has 76 seats in Parliament, five times what it had in the outgoing parliament and confirming its position as the strongest opposition force in the country.
Though surprised that the authorities have let it take so many seats, the Brotherhood complained again yesterday at the conduct of the elections, which have been marred by violence and police interference to restrict access to polling stations in areas where the Brotherhood is popular. On Thursday one man was shot dead in a constituency where a vocal leftist, Hamdin Sabahi, is trying to hold his seat.
