Egypt’s main Islamist parties won 65 percent of votes for party lists in the second round of a historic election for a new parliament after Hosni Mubarak’s ouster, the electoral committee said Saturday. The leading Islamist Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) won 40 out of 60 seats in the runoff for the second round of the three-stage elections, according to both the party and the official Al-Ahram newspaper.
The ultra-conservative Salafi Al-Nur party won 13 seats, Al-Ahram reported. In Egypt’s complex electoral system, voters cast ballots for party lists, which will compose two thirds of parliament, and direct votes for individual candidates for the remaining third. Most individual races go into runoffs. Islamists have dominated the elections, which opened on November 28, the first since an uprising ousted president Mubarak in February.
The second round began on December 14, and the third is due to start on January 3. The FJP won 32 individual seats in the first round of the vote, with four others going to allies, and 36 percent of the party list vote, followed by Al-Nur’s 24 percent. The remaining votes were split among various liberal and secular parties.