CAIRO: Nominations for Egypt's upcoming parliamentary elections opened today. Elections for the People's Assembly, the lower house of Egypt's bicameral parliament, will begin on November 28 and will be held in three rounds. The elections will be the first since the country's January 25 Revolution toppled President Hosni Mubarak and his regime from power. Electoral committees started receiving applications from nominees in all Egyptian governorates today. The Supreme Court for Elections (SCE), headed by Abdul Moez Ibrahim, earlier announced the rules and times for applications. SCE also determined the locations of electoral committees in each governorate. The SCE will receive applications from 9am until 2pm every day for one week. The window for applications will close on Tuesday, October 18. There are four separate forms: 1. People's Assembly application for individual regions; 2. People's Assembly application for party lists; 3. Shura Council (upper house) application for individual regions; 4. Shura Council application for party lists. Each candidate must present an official copy of membership to the political party to which he or she belongs, for those who will run through a party list. In Cairo governorate, the SCE started receiving applications for the People's Assembly at 9am today. SCE's Cairo headquarters are located in the Fifth Settlement. The committee said members of Egypt's formerly ruling but now-dissolved National Democratic Party (NDP) were the first to present their applications and documents. The committee added that there were very few female candidates and there were many media members present. The committee received 130 applications from People's Assembly candidates but only seven Shura Council applications before it closed for the day. The responsible team received the applications and handed the candidates their serial number in order to resume their application procedures tomorrow. In Giza governorate, tens of People's Assembly candidates went to the Giza Court to present their documents and applications. The Giza committee noted that there were very few representatives of political parties, but many independent candidates. Only one member of Muslim Brotherhood applied as independent. In Minya, a middle Egypt governorate, 22 candidates applied for People's Assembly seats and only one for the Shura Council. The Minya committee said people who were excluded from the NDP during its last session were the first to apply for People's Assembly seats. Some members of the Salafi Asala Party applied for the People's Assembly as well. In Ismailia, Suez Canal governorate, few applications were received. A former deputy of the NDP applied for the People's Assembly, as did other independent candidates, but there was only one application for the Shura Council. In Port Said, on Egypt's North Coast, 17 candidates applied for the People's Assembly and five for Shura Council. Applications were received from the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Freedom and Justice Party as well as from former members of the NDP and independents. In Damietta, in the Nile Delta, many members of the Free Egyptians Party opposed the joining of members of the dissolved DNP. They said allowing former NDP members to join was against their policies. They confirmed that joining NDP is against their policies. Arabic here
