Al-Masry Al-Youm has compiled a comprehensive tabulation of results from the first round of presidential elections, which ended yesterday.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s candidate, Mohamed Morsy, looks set to lead Egypt`s first presidential election poll following the uprising that deposed Hosni Mubarak last year, taking 5,446,460, or 24.9 percent of the votes. Ahmed Shafiq, a former civil aviation minister under Mubarak who was appointed during the president’s last days in office as prime minister, is a close second, with 5,338,285, or 24.5 percent of the votes. Nasserist candidate Hamdeen Sabbahi has surprised many observers by coming in third, with 4,616,937, or 21.1 percent of the votes. Abdel Moneim Abouel Fotouh, moderate Islamist and former Muslim Brotherhood member, was fourth with 3,889,195 or 17.8 percent of the votes. Amr Moussa, former secretary general of the Arab League and diplomat, came in fifth with 2,471,559, or 11.3 percent.
The results were obtained by Al-Masry Al-Youm reporters in twenty-seven governorates, following up on results from 13,000 polling stations. According to Al-Masry Al-Youm`s calculations, overall turnout throughout the country was 43.3 percent, lower than many had expected going into the historic election.
Official results will not be announced by the Presidential Election Commission, a committee of senior judges whose opinions cannot be appealed, for at least two more days. A runoff vote between the two leading candidates will take place on 16 and 17 June.
Sabbahi garnered the single highest voters` percentage in one city, riding a wave of last-minute popular support. He dominated Kafr al-Sheikh, his hometown, where sixty-three percent voted for him.
Morsy’s greatest success came in Fayoum, where forty-eight percent of voters supported him. Shafiq’s did the best in Monufiya Governorate, where fifty-three percent voted for him. Abouel Fottouh had the highest number of voters in Matrouh Govnorate with fifty-one percent of the ballots cast for him. Moussa’s territory was South Sinai where twenty-nine percent of voters opted for him.
In Cairo, where 12.8 percent of voters live, Sabbahi won twenty-nine percent of the vote, followed by Shafiq (twenty-seven percent), Morsy (seventeen percent), Abouel Fottouh (sixteen percent), and Moussa (eleven percent). In Giza, the second largest governorate with 8.4 percent of total voters nationwide, Morsy led with twenty-nine percent of the votes, followed by Sabbahi and Shafiq, both at twenty-one percent, and Abouel Fottouh at nineteen percent. Moussa won eleven percent of the votes.
Voter turnout in Port Said was the highest at sixty percent, followed by Alexandria with fifty-four percent. Turnout in Cairo, Damietta and Suez was fifty-three percent. The Delta had a high turnout with forty-nine percent voting in Monufiya, forty-eight percent in Sharqiya. In Daqahliya and Gharbiya, turnout was forty-five percent. In Beni Suef, south of Cairo, it was forty-three percent. In Kafr al-Sheikh turnout was forty-two percent and in Beheira it was forty-one percent. Upper Egypt had a lower turnout with thirty-nine percent voting in Fayoum, thirty-five percent in Assiut, thirty-three percent in Sohag, thirty percent in Aswan and twenty-nine percent in Luxor.
Qena witnessed the lowest turnout, at twenty-five percent.
Egypt Independent and Al-Masry Al-Youm will continue to publish more numbers and analysis throughout the evening.
[This article originally appeared in Egypt Independent.]