CAIRO: The Freedom and Justice Party, the political arm of the Muslim Brotherhood, says it is happy with how the first phase in the Egyptian parliamentary elections is proceeding. The party's general secretary, Muhammad al-Katatny, welcomed the high voter turn-out, saying that it was unsurprising, “since these are the elections that will affirm the people's will to exit from the bottle-neck of the transitional period into a parliament.” Katatny said that from a legal perspective, the voting operation took place in a satisfactory way in all stations apart from a delay in opening some stations due to ballot papers not having arrived, despite the presence of the supervising judges. The security situation was also satisfactory, the group said. Apart from the blocking of a road in Assiut, there had only been a small number of attempted displays of thuggery outside polling stations, all of which had been rapidly overcome by the security forces and popular committees. Katatny praised the role played by the supervisory judges in facilitating voters and observers, and said that the high voter turn-out was itself a protection against security violations. Katatny criticized elements in the media which were, he said, continuing to campaign against the Democratic Alliance and the Freedom and Justice Party in violation of all professional principles. He added that “some of them have even mocked the great participation of citizens in the most important elections in the history of the Egyptian people, but we don't find this surprising given that these channels belong to businessmen who have their own personal positions regarding this democratic transformation.” BM
