Egypt's elections are a dangerous crossroads, warns military junta
Head of armed forces warns polls must be successfully implemented and issues warning to 'meddling troublemakers'
The head of Egypt's military junta has said the country is at a crossroads between order and chaos, as polls open for nationwide elections on Monday amid continuing violence on the streets and splits among the political elite.
Millions of Egyptians are expected to participate in the largest democratic exercise undertaken in the Arab world, with Monday's ballot in the urban centres of Cairo and Alexandria marking the beginning of a 12-round, four-month voting process that will elect Egypt's first parliament since the toppling of Hosni Mubarak in February.
Elections are beginning even as city centres remain under occupation by protesters opposed to military rule, and come after nine days of almost uninterrupted clashes between revolutionaries and security forces which have left 42 dead and thousands injured.
Demonstrators claim the new parliament will have no genuine power and will serve as little more than a democratic fig leaf for the supreme council of the armed forces (Scaf), which has refused to stand down despite escalating bloodshed and calls from Washington for the generals to return to their barracks and give way to a civilian government.
"We will not allow troublemakers to meddle in these elections," said Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the head of Scaf, hours before voting was due to start. "We are at a crossroads. There are only two routes: the success of elections, leading Egypt towards safety, or facing dangerous hurdles that we in the armed forces, as part of the Egyptian people, will not allow."
Tantawi has been the central target of protesters in Tahrir Square and other rallies around the country, who accuse him of being an extension to the Mubarak regime and even more brutal and repressive than the dictator who preceded him. But the 76-year-old said he would not permit outside pressure to be applied to the junta, warning ! that for eign hands were behind the mounting turbulence and claiming the failure of Egypt to pull through it would lead to "extremely grave consequences".
Thousands of protesters rallied once again in Tahrir Square on Sunday, as former UN nuclear weapons chief Mohamed ElBaradei and moderate Islamist Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh both said they were willing to end their campaigns for the presidency in order to form a transitional government of national salvation that would displace power from the military.
An 11th-hour bid by the supreme elections commission, the body tasked with running the poll, for a partial delay prompted by the withdrawal of several judges from the vote-monitoring process as a result of the turmoil proved unsuccessful, meaning that Egyptians will flock to polling stations guarded by army soldiers and riot police, the very forces held by many to be responsible for the nationwide violence.
On Sunday the logistics of the election already appeared to be under strain, with many potential voters still unaware of where they were supposed to cast their ballot and some candidates trying desperately to withdraw their names from contention in an act of protest against Scaf and Tantawi.
Photographs of what appeared to be pre-marked ballot papers from Alexandria also circulated online, raising fears that the Mubarak-era practice of ballot-stuffing was not yet over.
"I filled in the online form which is supposed to tell you where your polling station is, but the website wasn't working and no official would get back to me so I'm still waiting to find out," said Mohamed Gaber, a 28-year-old frozen meat importer. He spoke to the Guardian on a rooftop overlooking Mohamed Mahmoud street, a central thoroughfare in the capital which has been the site of the fiercest fighting in recent days and is now almost completely sealed off by barbed wire, army soldiers and a 10ft concrete barricade separating demonstrators from police.
Gaber said he would be casting his ballot for the Freedo! m and Ju stice party, the political wing of the Muslim Brotherhood which is widely expected to emerge as the biggest single party in the new parliament. Several secular liberal and leftist forces have already withdrawn from the race.
Outside the nearby cabinet office, protesters opposed to the recent appointment of 78-year-old Kaamal el-Ganzouri as prime minister continue to block access to the building, demanding instead that Scaf cede power and a revolutionary government is formed from within Tahrir Square. "The ruling generals have fought us with guns, now they are fighting us with propaganda like these 'elections'," argued Marwan Ahmed, a 20-year-old medical student who has joined the occupation.
"How can we vote when there's no security? Apart from the big three or four parties, none of which offer anything new or revolutionary, I don't know anything about the candidates and I have no idea who to vote for. They're all part of the old system, and we're fighting for something completely new."
Voting in the parliamentary poll is technically compulsory, with those who fail to cast a ballot theoretically facing a fine of 500 Egyptian pounds (54) though experts predict this will be almost impossible to enforce. But many young protesters told the Guardian they were planning to get around the regulation by turning up at polling stations and scrawling "down with military rule" across their ballot paper.
Monday's and Tuesday's vote will be followed by a runoff election on 5 and 6 December, part of an intricately complex electoral system in which every Egyptian is covered by two different-sized constituencies and will elect MPs in two different ways. Further votes in other areas of the country will take place throughout December and January, with results for the lower house of parliament expected on 13 January and the upper house on 14 March.
Early on Monday morning two explosions hit Egypt's gas pipeline to Jordan and Israel. The blasts took place a short distance apart at al-Arish in Sin! ai. No o ne claimed responsibility. It is the eighth such attack since Mubarak stepped down on 11 February.
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