Renowned film producer Mohamed El-Adl, a prominent member of Hamdeen Sabbahi’s presidential campaign, has said members of the campaign had accepted the elimination of their candidate, although demonstrators in Tahrir Square had called on the Nasserist to join them and protest the final results of Egypt’s presidential election first round.
Egypt's Supreme Presidential Electoral Commission (SPEC) had officially announced earlier on Monday that Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Mursi and last Mubarak-era premier Ahmed Shafiq will face each other in a runoff vote slated for 16 and 17 June. Sabbahi came third and was disqualified as a result.
The decision was followed by growing tensions as a few thousand demonstrators headed to Tahrir to protest the results, and unknown assailants set ablaze the headquarters of the Shafiq’s electoral campaign, a luxurious Villa in Cairo’s Dokki district.
El-Adl, however, stressed that Sabbahi’s campaign would not follow suit and hit the streets. He told Ahram Online that, “The people are trapped between the Muslim Brotherhood and the past regime's remnants … At this point, I think the best thing to do is to boycott the runoffs.
“But we accept the results anyway, though we will continue the struggle to achieve the revolution’s goals,” he added.
However, El-Adl believes a second wave of the revolution is highly likely. "We did not embark on a revolution to elect someone from the regime that killed Egyptians in the Battle of the Camel, or conspired to kill us in the November clashes in Tahrir," he explained.
El-Adl also voiced satisfaction over the Sabbahi’s performance in the election, saying, “His campaigners were surprised by the final results, because despite all the recurring violations and forgery, he managed to secure about five million votes from all over Egypt, and almost made it to the runoffs.”
The campaigners of Mursi and Shafiq were repeatedly accused of paying off voters during the first round of the elections.
Sabbahi is understood to have filed appeals against some of the reported violations, only to be turned down by SPEC.
