AFP – Amid heavy security, Egyptians voted for a new president Monday in an election expected to sweep to power ex-army chief Field Marshal Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi.
The two-day election is the first since the frontrunner Al-Sisi deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in July, a move that unleashed the bloodiest violence in Egypt’s recent history.
Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood movement is boycotting the vote, as are revolutionary youth groups who fear Sisi is an autocrat in the making.
But the 59-year-old retired Field Marshal is expected to trounce his sole rival, leftist Hamdeen Sabbahi, amid widespread calls for stability.
Many view the vote as a referendum on stability versus the freedoms promised by the Arab Spring-inspired popular uprising that ousted veteran strongman Hosni Mubarak in 2011.
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