The repercussions of the recent Shura Council elections continued in several governorates with the arrests of number of supporters of various candidates and the release of others.
In the Beheira Governorate, Yasir Zaky, attorney general for the district of Damanhour, ordered that the nine supporters of Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Awad el-Ziat be kept in detention pending an investigation. The supporters were arrested on election day.
In related news, the Nadim Center for Psychological Rehabilitation and Treatment condemned the assault on the student Samy Fayez Urabi, a supporter of el-Ziat, who was shot on election day. The center called on Hatem el-Gabaly, minister of Health, and Hamdy el-Sayid, chairperson of the Doctor’s Syndicate, to inspect the Damanhour Teaching Hospital and open an investigation over claims that Urabi is handcuffed to his hospital bed even though he is about to enter surgery to remove the bullet lodged in his body. The center said it would hold the Ministries of the Interior and Health responsible for Urabi’s safety.
In a statement issued yesterday, the Nadim Center said the violations of citizens’ rights by the police that accompanied the Shura Council elections are nothing new and can be understood in the broader context of the Emergency Law. However, it was unacceptable for hospitals to become another instrument of police repression.
In the governorate of Daqahlia, the attorney general released seven individuals accused of smashing ballot boxes and burning candidates’ documents and requested that the issue be investigated further. Among the seven individuals released were two candidates.
Hamid Mahmoud el-Qadusi, an independent candidate from the district of el-Manzila said the police report filed against him that accuses him of smashing ballot boxes at the el-Gaafara school, is fraudulent. El-Qadusi said the supporters of Magdi el-Amir, the NDP candidate in the same district, was behind the destruction and el-Amir is trying to frame him and his supporters. These actions took place because his supporters resisted efforts by the NDP to close the polling stations in order to shore up the votes for el-Amir, said el-Qadusi.
“There were ballot boxes that were tampered with at more than one polling station and their votes were still included in the tallying process,” said el-Qadusi, adding that he will appeal the process.
In Qena, nearly 300 supporters of Anwar Sabara, an independent candidate in the village of Gragus in the fourth district of Qawas, organized a demonstration protesting Sabara’s loss. They gathered in front of the Gragus police station threw rocks at the station and the police officers surrounding it, chanted slogans against security forces and set three motorcycles on fire.
Security forces successfully extinguished the fires and dispersed the demonstrators, arresting 14 of Sabara’s supporters from the protest.
In related news, security in Qana released 17 supporters of the independent candidate Ahmad Mukhtar Othman who ran for election in the second district of Naga Hammadi. The supporters were arrested for rioting in front of the vote counting committee in Naga Hammadi.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
