Vote counting kicks off in Egypt amid initial confirmations of Sisi’s victory

The vote counting of Egypt's presidential elections for 2024 kicked off on Tuesday, 12 December, across the country, immediately after the ballot officially closed at 9 PM local time (7 GMT) as initial confirmations have indicated the victory of incumbent President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi over the three other candidates.

An official source at the National Elections Authority (NEA) – tasked with managing the vote - told The New Arab, on condition of anonymity, that "so far Sisi has swept the elections marred by about 45 per cent voter turnout" of over 65 million registered voters. 

On Tuesday, NEA executive director Ahmed Bendary said that the elections were conducted under the judicial supervision of 15,000 judges, whereas 22,340 local observers and 4,218 journalists monitored the vote at 9,376 polling stations nationwide.

Five hundred twenty-eight reporters from 33 countries covered the polls, according to the State Information Service (SIS), which offers accreditation for journalists.

Other than Sisi, three candidates have run for the country's most influential public post: Farid Zahran, head of the opposition Social Democratic Party, Abdel-Sanad Yamama, head of the country's oldest liberal party Al-Wafd, and Hazem Omar, head of the People's Republican Party.

The elections were initially expected to occur in early 2024 but were brought forward a few months earlier. The final result will be released on 18 December if no run-off is required.

The results are widely considered a foregone conclusion for most Egyptians, particularly after previous rounds from 2014 onwards gave improbable majorities to Sisi, and the detention of rival candidates marked all.

Two presidential hopefuls had earlier withdrawn from the race for not meeting the required conditions, including Ahmed Tantawi, ex-MP and journalist, and Gameela Ismail, the Al-Dostour party chairwoman and a former journalist.

Tantawi has been facing a criminal trial with 22 of his campaigners for allegedly circulating unauthorised printed forms of endorsement for the elections, among other charges.

The elections this year have been held amid an unforgiving economic crisis facing the most populous Arab country, also overshadowed by the Israeli ongoing onslaught of the Palestinian Gaza Strip bordering Egypt's North Sinai province and civil war in neighbouring Sudan.

The Egyptian pound has lost almost half of its value against the US dollar, making the essential commodities out of the reach of ordinary citizens in a country primarily dependent on importation rather than local production.

Over the past months, the government has begun selling state assets to wealthy Gulf nations, including army-owned firms, to attract foreign currency and liberate the economy from state control, a significant demand of a multi-billion-dollar-loan programme signed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The situation has been exacerbated by alleged corruption and an eight-year borrowing spree, which has seen the state spend money on "white elephant" projects such as the New Administrative Capital and road expansions and sales.