The upcoming runoff election scheduled for Saturday and Sunday is a choice between bad and worse, said former presidential candidate Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh at a press conference in Tanta on Tuesday evening.
Hundreds of Abouel Fotouh’s campaign members and supporters in Gharbiya and Kafr al-Sheikh were in attendance.
The former candidate asserted that his campaign remains faithful to thwarting former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq, popularly known as “the feloul [remnants] candidate.” Abouel Fotouh explained that his campaign discussed whether to support Freedom and Justice Party candidate Mohamed Morsy or to boycott the election altogether.
“Everyone had to choose between bad and worse,” Abouel Fotouh added, stressing that he finally reached the decision to support Morsy.
Abouel Fotouh said this decision was not based on revenge, but on the interests of Egypt.
He stated that in the meetings held between himself, Morsy, and former candidate Hamdeen Sabbahi, it was suggested that Morsy should pull out of the runoff election and join the other candidates in forming a presidential council.
“What we [the Abouel Fotouh campaign] have achieved in the election was with our own efforts. Our votes were lawful, and were not the result of funding from abroad, as was the case with some of the candidates, or the support of security services, like others,” Abouel Fotouh stated.
On its website, Al-Shorouk newspaper wrote on Tuesday that Abouel Fotouh had accused several parties of participating in the smearing of his proposed platform and quoted him as stating that “the dishonest media reversed facts and mixed truth with falsehood.”
Abouel Fotouh acknowledged that the endorsement from the Salafi Nour Party “weakened the performance of the campaign.” He justified the agreement by pointing to the fact that the party had gained more than 8 million votes in parliamentary elections, but the sum of their votes in the presidential election did not reach two million.
Abouel Fotouh described the Nour Party performance as being very weak, and stated that there was a lack of control over their base. “But we will not allow anyone to accuse them of treason and conspiracy, because their administration was sincere,” he stated.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
