CAIRO: The opposition Muslim Brotherhood accused the government on Monday of rigging Egypt's parliamentary election by stopping its candidates from campaigning and arresting nearly 250 of its supporters.
Senior Brotherhood official Mohammed Mursi told a press conference that the “violence against opposition candidates, particularly those of the Brotherhood”showed the government was bent on “falsifying the will of Egyptians.”
Since the Brotherhood announced in early October that it would contest the election being held over two rounds, starting on Sunday, more than 1,200 of its supporters have been rounded up, of whom around 500 remain in custody, he said.
The group, which registers its candidates as independents to skirt an Egyptian ban on religious parties, is fielding 130 for the 508 seats in parliament.
Saad al-Katatni, who headed the Brotherhood bloc in the outgoing parliament in which it held a fifth of the seats, said: “What is going on with these elections is beyond imagination.
“What is underway is the effective rigging of the elections,” he said, adding that he was surrounded by security agents everywhere he went in his campaign for re-election.
Earlier on Monday, Egyptian civil society groups threatened to boycott the poll because of obstacles to their observation mission.
Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights chief Hafez Abu Seada said poll observers were being required to seek authorisation from the heads of individual polling stations on top of clearance from the electoral commission.
He urged President Hosni Mubarak to intervene immediately in keeping with his pledge of free elections to allow NGOs to do their work unhindered.
Abu Seada said four people had already been killed in campaign-related violence, without giving details, and warned that the situation was likely to deteriorate.
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