SHURA COUNCIL ELECTIONS: NDP "WINS" SWEEPING

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 CAIRO 001823

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

NSC FOR WATERS AND DAVIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/13/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL KDEM EG
SUBJECT: SHURA COUNCIL ELECTIONS: NDP "WINS" SWEEPING
VICTORY

REF: A. CAIRO 1777


B. CAIRO 1717

Classified By: Charge Stuart E. Jones, for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).


1. (C) Summary: The official results of the June 11 Shura
Council elections, released amid widespread claims of fraud,
are that the ruling National Democratic Party won 59 seats
(out of the 77 seats in contention). The opposition Taggamu
Party won one. No Muslim Brotherhood (MB) candidates won
seats. 17 races will move to run-off elections on June 18;
none of those contests will involve any MB or opposition
candidates. Egypt's Supreme Electoral Commission (SEC)
announced that voter turnout was 31.32 percent; NGO's and
monitoring organizations assert turnout did not exceed six
percent. The SEC's weak first-time performance, in which it
appeared overshadowed by the Ministry of Interior, and did
little to establish credibility as an independent actor, sets
an unfortunate precedent for future Egyptian elections. The
shut-out of the MB, as well as the harsh government campaign
of arrests prior to the elections, is indicative of severely
diminished GOE tolerance for the MB's participation in
Egyptian politics. End summary.

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THE OFFICIAL RESULTS
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2. (C) After a 24-hour delay in releasing the official
election results, the Supreme Elections Commission (SEC)
announced late in the afternoon of June 13 that the ruling
National Democratic Party (NDP) won 59 of the contested Shura
Council seats, while the Taggamu Party won one seat in
Alexandria, and 17 races will move to run-off elections on
June 18. No MB-affiliated candidate won a seat, and none of
the run-off races include MB or opposition party candidates;
only NDP candidates and NDP-affiliated independents are in
the running. One of the victorious NDP candidates is a woman
- the first female ever elected to the Shura Council.

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SEC ALLEGES 31.23% VOTER TURNOUT
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3. (C) SEC chairman Adel Andrawes announced that voter
turnout was 31.23 percent, and that the "increase in
participation" was due to the establishment of the SEC ("an
independent entity which has given the voters confidence in
participation"),"the political momentum that Egypt is
witnessing due to the recent constitutional amendments," "the
increase in female voters," and "the calm atmosphere in which
elections took place." (Note: 31.23 percent voter turnout
would mean that approximately 11 million of Egypt's 35.8
million registered voters cast ballots. This is an increase
from the official figure of 27.1 percent turnout in the March
national referendum on constitutional amendments. End note).
Various Egyptian NGO's and monitoring organizations have
reported that voter turnout did not exceed six percent, an
estimate that tracks with the minimal number of voters that
Emboffs observed (as reported ref A, Embassy teams visited
polling stations in nine Egyptian governorates). Emboffs
consistently saw polling stations throughout the day with
merely a handful of voters, or none at all.

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ALLEGATIONS OF RAMPANT FRAUD
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4. (C) Complaints of fraud and rigging have emerged from
civil society and media reporting. SEC spokesman Sameh
El-Kashef asserted that the reported incidents of fraud were
"individual occurrences," and not indicative of broader
problems. Al Jazeera aired footage of security officers
stuffing ballot boxes, filmed through an open window at a
polling station. Monitoring organizations reported numerous
instances of security services blocking opposition voters'
access to polling stations, preventing opposition candidates
and their representatives from entering polling stations,
vote-buying, and the prevention of registered observers from
monitoring the casting of votes. Independent monitors
reported several cases of voters with beards or wearing veils
(i.e., presumed voters for the MB) being turned away from
polling stations. Five registered election monitors were
reportedly arrested; two have since been released.


5. (C) As noted ref A, Embassy officers witnessed a range of
irregularities, from NDP officials casually stuffing ballot
boxes at countryside polling stations, to presumed MB voters
being turned away from polling stations. Emboffs visiting

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districts known to be MB-strongholds observed some polling
stations closed at mid-day. One Emboff was approached
outside of a polling station by a representative of an
independent candidate, who alleged that he was not allowed in
to observe the vote, as NDP officials were doing. Emboffs
observed numerous transparent ballot boxes that were either
near-empty, or packed to the brim.


6. (C) An Embassy contact who is a judge that participated in
counting ballots told us that he observed several instances
of fraud. (Note: Under Egypt's revised Political Rights Law,
judges no longer supervise voting in polling stations, but do
observe vote-counting at central polling stations in each
district. End note). This judge alleged that in the
operations center of the SEC in Mansoura, he witnessed a
ballot box being opened by an MOI official, who placed a
thick stack of ballots into it. The judge also saw "several
instances" of 20-30 ballots in a ballot box that were all
folded together (an impossibility if different voters had
cast the ballots separately).

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RELIGIOUS SLOGANS STILL IN USE
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7. (C) Despite the recent changes to the Political Rights Law
that ban the use of religious slogans and symbols in
campaigns, Koranic references were in full view on the
posters of NDP, independent, and MB candidates. Emboffs
across the Nile Delta region observed only a few posters of
MB candidates (with the presumption being that they had been
torn down). In response to the removal of posters, in some
towns the MB had spray-painted the names of candidates on the
walls, as well as hung banners stating, "Islam is the
Solution," without the name of a candidate. In Sharqiyya
province, poloff observed several election posters for
different NDP candidates replete with Koranic verses,
prayers, and the slogan, "God Is With Us." Contrastingly, in
the same electoral district, we saw numerous posters for two
different MB candidates that did not use the MB,s
traditional religious slogan, but rather, simply the words,
"Together for Reform."

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SEC IN "FULL COOPERATION" WITH
INTERIOR MINISTRY
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8. (C) As expected, the Ministry of Interior role in the
elections appeared to surpass that of the new Supreme
Elections Commission (SEC). MOI personnel were in charge of
all polling stations that Emboff's visited, while we met no
SEC officers or observers. According to remarks by the SEC's
spokesman, the SEC worked "in full cooperation with the
Interior Ministry." One Embassy judicial contact involved in
elections oversight told us that while visiting SEC
headquarters in the week leading up to the elections, he saw
two checks from the SEC to the MOI, for 50 million LE and 37
million LE respectively (a total of roughly 15 million USD),
which he took as an indication that the SEC was effectively
ceding much of its funding and oversight role to the MOI. On
June 14, independent and opposition newspapers printed
headlines criticizing the SEC's performance: "The SEC Failed
the Test of the Shura Elections" (Nahdet Masr) and "The
Scandalous Elections Fraud Puts the SEC Into Crisis" (Al
Wafd).

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MB DENOUNCES RESULTS
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9. (C) An MB statement (posted on the group's website)
denounced the election results as "a setback for democracy."
It continued, "The magnitude of violations and crimes
committed on election day is unprecedented in the history of
Egyptian elections. These violations included closing voting
centers, denying citizens access to vote, assaulting and
beating voters and candidates, threatening and intimidating
heads and member of the voting committees, and stuffing
ballot boxes. These crimes were preceded by preventing MB
candidates from campaigning and hanging posters .... We
declare that we will ... continue to press for comprehensive
reform ... so as to elect parliaments that express the free
will of Egyptians ..." The spokesman for the MB's
parliamentary bloc, Hamdi Hassan, told reporters, "With such
an 'election,' Egypt has become a laughing stock around the
world." Other MB parliamentarians were quoted in Egyptian
papers as saying, "If we won 20 percent of the seats in the
People's Assembly in 2005, how could we win no seats in the

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Shura Council in 2007? These elections were a complete fraud."

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IMPORT OF THE ELECTIONS
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10. (C) Although the recent amendments to the constitution
bolstered the Shura Council's limited role, the body remains
a bit player on the Egyptian political scene. Seats on it
are desirable largely due to the prestige, contacts, and
parliamentary immunity that they provide. The results of the
June 11 election will have little impact on the functioning
of the Shura Council itself, which will continue to be
overwhelmingly dominated by the NDP, and thus effectively a
rubber-stamp for the ruling party. The SEC's weak first-time
performance, in which it did little to establish credibility
as an independent actor, sets an unfortunate precedent for
future Egyptian elections. Despite GOE claims regarding
voter turnout, the trickles of voters on election day are
indicative of the Egyptian citizenry's lack of interest and
lack of confidence in electoral proceedings. Lastly, the
shut-out of the MB, as well as the harsh government campaign
of arrests prior to the elections (between 790-900 MB members
were detained in the two weeks leading up election day),
indicates diminished GOE tolerance for the MB's participation
in Egyptian politics, compared to the 2005 People's Assembly
elections.
JONES