Egypt's largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), announced on Wednesday its withdrawal from next week's parliamentary runoffs. A senior source within the group told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the decision was taken due to the widespread reports of electoral fraud that accompanied the first round of polling on Sunday, in which MB candidates failed to decisively win a single seat in the People's Assembly. “Seventy-two percent of the brotherhood's Shura Council voted to withdraw from the runoffs,” the group said in a statement. The council acts as an advisory board to the group's authoritative Guidance Bureau. The ruling National Democratic Party (NDP) of President Hosni Mubarak, meanwhile, secured the overwhelming majority of parliamentary seats in the first round of voting. Of the 508 seats in parliament, 43 percent were decided in Sunday. The rest will be decided in next week's runoffs. Opposition parties were quick to dismiss the results. The MB, for its part, expects to be almost entirely swept out of parliament by what it described as rampant vote-rigging, vote-buying and intimidation and violence--allegations that have been echoed by local and international rights groups. Such an outcome would represent an enormous blow to Egypt's most formidable opposition force, which shocked the ruling NDP in the last election in 2005 by winning 88 seats, or one fifth of parliament. A sustained government crackdown has since weakened the group, which is formally outlawed but nevertheless fields candidates as nominal independents. MB leader Mohamed Badie said Mubarak's government had broken its promise to hold fair elections, but vowed that the group would never resort to violence. "We will not allow anyone to tempt us into breaking the law," he told a news conference on Tuesday. "The crimes committed by the regime clearly reflect its weakness and confusion. ... Whatever is built on falsehood is false," he added. "The election is invalid." Results announced Tuesday showed the ruling party had so far secured 217 seats. Opposition parties won five seats--Wafd (2); leftist Tagammu (1); the Moussa Moustafa faction of the Ghad party (1); and the Social Justice Party (1). Three independent candidates also won seats. Twenty-seven MB candidates qualified to stand in the runoffs, following races in which no candidate won more than 50 percent of the vote. All other secular opposition parties combined have 16 candidates standing in Sunday's runoffs. The first round had been closely watched for indications of Egypt's political trajectory ahead of a crucial presidential election in 2011. Mubarak, who has ruled Egypt for nearly 30 years and is now 82, underwent gallbladder surgery earlier this year. Many believe he is positioning his son, Gamal, to succeed him--but there is widespread public opposition to the perceived "inheritance" of power. The ferocity of the police crackdown on the brotherhood could indicate a concern among authorities that uncertainty over Mubarak's continued grip on power could open the way to greater public dissent in a country that already suffers from widespread poverty and unemployment. Opponents say the ruling party hoped to lock down parliament to ensure that it did not become a platform for dissent. In the run-up to the 28 November elections, at least 1400 brotherhood supporters were arrested. Last week, an Alexandria court sentenced 12 MB members to jail for using religious slogans during their electoral campaigns in violation of rules set by the state-run High Elections Commission. Wednesday also saw the opposition liberal Wafd Party announce its withdrawal from the run-offs to protest what it described as “electoral fraud.” Like other opposition parties, Wafd officials accused the NDP of rigging the elections with the help of the security forces. Leading Wafd Party member Baha Abu Shaqa also announced his resignation from the Shura Council, the upper house of Egypt's bicameral Parliament. Six Wafd Party candidates had qualified to compete in the runoffs after the party won only two seats outright in the first round.
