CAIRO: An Egyptian lawyer filed a urgent appeal to Egypt's Attorney General asking that presidential finalist and military strongman Ahmed Shafiq would be banned from leaving the country until the lawsuits against him in Egyptian courts are finalized and competed. Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsi's campaign has announced himself the race's winner on Monday, with a about a one million vote difference between him and Shafiq. The electoral high committee announced that it would officially name the winner on Thursday. Shafiq, jailed president Mubarak's last prime minister and former minister of civil aviation for almost a decade currently has 35 corruption cases against him. The cases were first handled in military courts, but later they were transferred to the general attorney who transferred them back to the military court once again. Rights activists see that as an attempt from the military ruling council to hold back the cases, in case Shafiq were to be found guilty. Many cases were filed on behalf of workers at the ministry of civil aviation, accusing their former minister of financial corruption. Shafiq, who had an iron fist over the ministry and the aviation sector in Egypt for 9 years, is accused of wasting billion of pounds of public money. Former employees accuse him of embezzling 4 billion Egyptian pounds ($800 million). He was known for having zero tolerance for strikes and had fired many workers who attempted to do so. Several protests against him running for the presidency were held outside the Cairo International Airport to protest his candidacy and calling for the court cases to be processed. Once the initial results were announced and Shafiq was behind, many called on the general attorney to ban Shafiq from traveling.
