The official campaign of Nasserist politician Hamdeen Sabahi filed an appeal against the presidential election's preliminary results, the campaign's spokesman Hossam Moenes announced on Friday. Sabahi, who suffered a drastic loss in this week's poll, gaining only 3.5 percent of the vote, admitted he lost the race in a press conference on Thursday. His contender, El-Sisi, won a landslide victory of over 96 percent of valid votes, with over 23 million voters casting their ballots for him. Invalid votes – or spoilt ballots – exceeded 1 million, higher than the votes for Sabahi. Turnout was around 47 percent, according to Baseera. The long-time leftist activist, however, accused the electoral procedure of lacking credibility, citing violations that he says his campaign faced during the election – including his campaign representatives being restricted, attacked and detained, as well as suspicions of forgery and El-Sisi's representatives being allowed to campaign inside polling stations. He also questioned the "credibility or ratification" of the announced turnout or results, which he described as "an insult to Egyptian intelligence of the Egyptians." Sabahi further rejected a decision by the Presidential Elections Commission (PEC) to extend voting by a third day. Both his and El-Sisi's campaign filed a formal complaint against the decision, which were later rejected. The deadline for receiving appeals on the vote results is Friday. The PEC will issue a final verdict on the appeals on Saturday afternoon. Official results are expected to be announced on Tuesday or Wednesday. Source: Ahram Online
