CAIRO - Egypt's State-backed human rights watchdog Sunday lent support to the Government's opposition to allow foreign monitoring of the next month's legislative elections.
The opposition was expressed by members of the Human Rights Council during a meeting in Cairo Sunday with Minister of State for Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Mofied Shehab.
Both the official and the rights council welcomed local monitoring of the upcoming elections by facilitating 'recognised' civil society groups to have access to polling stations, according to the official Middle East News Agency (MENA).
"The Government is keen to promote human rights, which have recently witnessed significant progress," said Shehab.
Egypt's Higher Commission for Parliamentary Elections said last week that the maximum expenditure by parliamentary hopefuls campaigning for the legislative elections is LE200,000 ($38,000).
No candidate should spend more than LE200,000 in his campaign for the first round of polls. However, the financial ceiling for those who might go for a re-run should not exceed LE100,000," said el-Sayyed Abdel Aziz Omar, the head of the commission.
The Central Auditing Agency always audits the election campaign accounts of candidates, releasing reports of those who violated the financial regulations of the campaigns.
Egypt's elections for the Lower House of the Parliament are expected to be held on November 29 and the re-run will be held a week later.
This is the first time the elections are held on the same day in all governorates across the nation.
The commission has also rejected calls to allow international observers to monitor the polls, saying that Egypt has well-established civil society organisations that can follow the process.
