Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood has registered 134 candidates to run in this month's parliamentary election, Brotherhood members said on Tuesday, but an election commission has already rejected a handful of them. Additional members of the Brotherhood, which skirts a ban by running as independents, can be blocked from running in the 28 November election, which is being watched internationally to see how much leeway the authorities allow the opposition. Egypt's electoral commission, which will examine the applications until 14 November, can exclude candidates for a range of reasons, such as failing to complete documents and failure to fulfill military service. "So far 134 have submitted applications," one campaign organizer said, adding that four had been rejected but are contesting the decision. President Hosni Mubarak's ruling National Democratic Party is expected to sweep most seats. The Islamist group is not expected to repeat its 2005 success when it ran 165 candidates and secured 88 seats, becoming the largest opposition bloc. But frequent security sweeps, which intensify around elections, curb its clout. In that vote, the Brotherhood and independent observers said many voters who supported the Brotherhood and other opposition candidates were blocked by police from casting their votes. The authorities insisted the vote was fair. Some political analysts say the group may gain no more than 20 seats this time and they expect Wafd, a decades-old liberal nationalist party, to become the biggest opposition block in parliament. Wafd is fielding about 250 candidates. The government has said it would allow Egyptian civil society groups to monitor the vote but has refused to allow any foreign observers. Some 14 people were killed in 2005 election violence. Muslim Brotherhood members fought with security which tried to prevent voters from accessing polling stations.
