Global media is widely reporting that the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has won 36.6 percent of the vote in the first round of elections, slightly less than the 40% that had been earlier reported. According to an AP report, the Salafi party captured 24.4%:
CAIRO — Islamist parties captured more than 60 percent of the vote in the first round of Egypt’s parliamentary elections, according to partial results released Sunday. The Islamic fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood’s political arm, the Freedom and Justice Party, garnered 36.6 percent of the 9,734,413 valid ballots cast for party lists. The Nour Party, a more hardline Islamist group, captured 24.4 percent of the vote, according to figures provided by the High Election Commission.The partial results only give an indication of how the new parliament will look like, as two more rounds of voting in 18 of Egypt’s 27 provinces are yet be held in the multi-stage voting that will run through January.The elections, which began Nov. 28, are the first since protests that forced authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak to step down on Feb. 11 after three decades in power and hand over control to a military council. Turnout of around 60 percent was the highest in the country’s modern history as few participated in the heavily rigged votes under Mubarak.The early results indicate Islamist parties are set to control the majority of the parliament.The new parliament, in theory, is tasked with selecting a 100-member panel to draft a new constitution. The ruling Supreme Council of the Armed Forces has suggested that it will choose 80 of those members. The ruling generals have also indicated that the parliament will have no say in naming a new government.The ballots are also a confusing mix of individual races and party lists, and the Sunday results only reflect the party list performance for less than a third of the 498-seat parliament.The liberal Egyptian Bloc came in behind the two Islamist lists with 13.4 percent of the votes. Another liberal list, the Wafd Party, received 7.1 percent, while the moderate Islamist Wasat or Centrist Party took 4.3 percent.It is not yet clear whether the Islamist parties will form one coalition inside the parliament, or the Brotherhood will seek to ally with the liberal forces against the more radical Nour Party.The final shape of the parliament will not be announced before January.The next step in the complex process, a round of runoffs between individual candidates competing in the first round, is set to begin Monday.