CAIRO: The Egyptian Medical Syndicate today witnessed its first elections in 19 years. The committee authorized to monitor the elections decided to form a number of subcommittees inside the election headquarters. The subcommittees were chaired by certain judges, according to the Medical Syndicate's website. Law No. 100 from 1993 prohibited elections over the past 19 years. This law concerns the electoral process for Egyptian professional syndicates. However the law was cancelled on January 2, 2011 by a Supreme Constitutional Court verdict. The electoral committee permitted each candidate to have on deputy, so long as he or she is stamped and sealed by the Syndicate. The committee prohibited photography and video recording that did not have prior judicial permission inside the balloting halls. The Head of the High Electoral Committee for the Medical Syndicate elections Saad Fityani expanded the voting time from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. in the Al-Azhar Conference Center in Nasr City. This decision was as a result of delayed voting processes. Tareq Ghazali, a candidate for chairman of the Medical Syndicate, accused the electoral committee of blocking the voting process for Muslim Brotherhood candidates, and justified such action based on chaos at the voting places. Most of the electoral committee members belong to the Muslim Brotherhood, said Ghazali. The voting process was also conducted outside the balloting halls due to the large number of voters. There are 27 balloting halls across Egypt.
