CAIRO: Protesters clashed with police Monday, setting fire to cars, tires and two schools used as polling stations in riots sparked by alleged widespread fraud by the ruling party in Egypt's parliamentary elections. The Muslim Brotherhood acknowledged it had been heavily defeated, blaming vote rigging.
Riots broke out in several Egyptian cities a day after the voting, and in some places police fired tear gas to disperse protesters.
Egypt's opposition says the government of this top US ally was using the election to secure a complete monopoly over parliament and prevent dissent ahead of more significant presidential elections next year.
The upcoming vote is clouded in uncertainty, because the man who has ruled Egypt for nearly three decades, 82-year-old President Hosni Mubarak, has had health issues and underwent surgery earlier this year.
A coalition of local and international rights groups Monday reported that the balloting was marred by widespread rigging after the government prevented monitoring.
It said opposition candidate representatives and independent monitors who were supposed to be allowed to watch the voting were barred from almost all polling stations around the country, allowing officials to stuff ballot boxes.
Though official results are not due until Tuesday, candidate supporters around the country took to the streets in anger after hearing word their favorites lost.
In the southern province of Assiut, police fired tear gas at a procession of Muslim Brotherhood supporters armed with sticks who were carrying their candidate Mahmoud Helmi and chanting ''Islam is the winner.''
Further south in the city of Luxor, backers of an independent candidate set fire to cars and clashed with security forces. Five people were injured and 30 arrested.
Other protests erupted in Egypt's northern Delta region. Around 500 backers of the secular opposition Wafd party clashed with ruling party supporters in Gharbiya, and police fired into the air and shot tear gas to disperse them.
Other protesters set fire to two schools used as polling stations in Menoufiya and burned tires outside a station south of the Mediterranean coastal city of Alexandria, briefly blocking the main highway to Cairo.
In a statement, the High Election Commission dismissed reports of violence or irregularities during the voting, saying that the few incidents it uncovered ''did not undermine the electoral process as a whole.''
The ruling party secretary-general, Safwat el-Sherif, blamed the Brotherhood for fomenting reports of fraud.
Defeating the Islamic fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood appeared to be the government's main goal in the election. The group, though banned, is Egypt's strongest opposition movement and in 2005 elections stunned the government by winning a fifth of parliament's seats, its strongest showing ever.
The Brotherhood's media official, Abdel-Galil el-Sharnoubi, acknowledged that when the results are announced, his movement may end up with almost no seats. He said none of its 130 candidates have so far secured a seat, either losing to the National Democratic Party or facing a Dec. 5 runoff.
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