Former presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq has said that he was told by intelligence services and the military that he was the real winner of the 2012 presidential race before his competitor, deposed president Mohamed Morsi, was announced the victor.
Shafiq, currently based in Abu Dhabi and surrounded by rumors on souring relations with the incumbent government in Cairo, told the staellite TV channel Al-Youm late Tuesday that former intelligence chief, Mourad Mowafy, told him during a phone call on the eve of the announcement of the results that he had contacted neighboring states informing them Shafiq had won the votes.
“Former chief of the Armed Forces staff, Sami Anan, had also called me on the eve of the announcement of the presidency elections results, telling me that 'Everything is all right, but do not forget us,'” Shafiq told the show, stressing that the results had been manipulated.
Shafiq told the show that former US ambassador Anne Patterson had met him four times during the polls.
“At one meeting she asked me ‘Why don't you announce the results?' ‘Within a week’, I replied. ‘Rigging must be happening right now’, she said,” Shafiq added.
Shafiq’s claims were denied by Anan, who stressed he had no idea about the results beforehand.
“I heard the results just like the rest of Egyptians,” Anan, who was forced into early retirement by Morsi in 2012, told the satellite TV channel al-Nahar Tuesday. “How could I have congratulated Shafiq?”.
Shafiq’s lawyers have been pushing for a challenge to the elections results and an investigation into the possibility of forgery.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
