Violence, vote rigging mar Egypt's Shura election

One man was killed on Monday in a clash between supporters of rival candidates as Egyptians voted in an election for parliament's upper house amid claims of vote rigging and a massive crackdown on the main opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood.

Polling stations opened at 8 a.m. (05:00 GMT) and are due to stay open until 7 p.m. (16:00 GMT). A second round will be held on June 18.

The voting pits the Egyptian president's ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) against the country's powerful Islamist opposition group, which is participating in Shura Council – upper house – elections for the first time.

The violence erupted shortly after the opening of the polls, killing one and leaving three wounded, the interior ministry said.

Ahmed Abdel Salam Ghanem was caught in the crossfire in a clash between supporters of the NDP candidate and his independent rival in the Nile Delta town of Husseiniya, interior ministry spokesman Tarek Attia told reporters.

The elections see 587 candidates competing for 88 seats in 24 provinces, 109 from the NDP, 19 from the Brotherhood and the remainder from smaller opposition groups or running as independents. Two principal opposition parties, al-Wafd and Nasserite, are boycotting the elections.

The Muslim Brotherhood defied a new constitutional ban on political activity based on religion and fielded candidates as independents under their slogan "Islam is the solution."

Crackdown, rigging

The Islamist group said 75 of their members were arrested in four provinces on Monday. A security source confirmed the arrests.

The Islamists have also complained of being turned away from polling stations and of alleged fraud.

"In Damietta, in the Nile Delta, ballot boxes already full arrived at the voting station in Izbat al-Borg," the group said in a statement.

Some 1,850 permits were granted to local and international groups to monitor the ballot, according to the Higher Election Commission spokesman, Sameh al-Kashef.

But independent election monitors said they were barred from entering polling stations and reported the closure of stations where Islamist candidates are running.

"The trend has been that all the stations where Islamists are running have been closed and observers were barred from entering," election monitor Tarek Zaghloul from the Egyptian Organization for Human Rights told AFP.

In Cairo, an AFP reporter and photographer were barred from entering the Hawamdeya polling station, where officials said they needed special permits, contrary to Information Ministry guidelines.

Brotherhood candidates complained that government agents beat them up inside polling stations and committed electoral abuses including stuffing ballot boxes before voting started, according to Reuters.

Riot police sealed off at least two polling stations in Ausim northwest of Cairo and a bystander told Reuters: "It's because there are lots of Brotherhood supporters here." A police officer who asked not to be named cited "national security".

Police used the same method to reduce the Brotherhood vote in the northern coastal town of Baltim, where women in Islamic headscarves said police had turned them away, witnesses said.

"What freedom are they talking about?" said Amani, a woman who refused to give her last name. "No freedom! They won't allow us in," several women chanted.

Egypt’s parliamentary system has two houses – the lower house (People’s Assembly) and the upper house (Shura Council). The People’s Assembly has 454 members, most of them are elected for a five-year term, while the president appoints 10 members.

The Shura Council is a 264-seat consultative body that gained limited legislative powers from recent constitutional amendments. Only 176 of them are elected, while the president appoints 88. Elections and appointments are executed on a rotating basis, with one half of the council renewed every three years.