Former head of the International Agency for Atomic Energy, Mohamed ElBaradei, who pulled out of the presidential race, received signatures from 45,000 Egyptians supporting him to run for the presidency, a close supporter told the independent Dostor news website.
Some 30,000 of those signatures are from Egyptians living in the Gulf countries, and the 15,000 came from inside Egypt, Egyptian Social Democratic Party MP Basem Kamel, who has close ties with ElBaradei, told Dostor.
The signatures were collected by supporters of ElBaradei to convince him to reverse his decision not to run in the poll, Kamel added.
ElBaradei is pleased to have this kind of support, but said that he will not go on back on the decision because the reasons behind his decision still stand, Kamel added.
The Nobel laureate announced in January that he would not run in the presidential race because he felt that the former regime had not fallen and that a democratic poll could not take place under military rule.
The Presidential Elections Law allows independent candidates to run the race if they collect 30,000 signatures from citizens from 15 different governorates.
