CAIRO: A court yesterday banned members of the Muslim Brotherhood, a movement listed as a “terrorist group”, from running in Egypt’s upcoming elections, a lawyer and state media said.
Egypt’s military-installed authorities are engaged in a crackdown against the Islamist movement.
A court in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria ordered authorities to bar any candidacies from Brotherhood members or former members in presidential and parliamentary elections.
The ruling came after an anti-Brotherhood group filed a petition calling for the ban.
“It is illogical to receive such candidacies after the government designated the Brotherhood a terrorist organisation,” Tareq Mahmoud, a lawyer from the group said. “We submitted videos, photos and documents showing terrorist acts carried out by the Muslim Brotherhood, which is why it is illogical that they lead the country or represent its people in elections.”
Egypt is to hold a May 26-27 presidential election, widely expected to be won by ex-army chief Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, to be followed by parliamentary polls.
Sisi is riding a wave of popularity after he ousted Egypt’s Islamist president Mohamed Mursi last July. Mursi belongs to the Brotherhood.
Since his overthrow, the authorities have cracked down brutally on the movement and its members.
The ruling against the Brotherhood came hours after a bomb attack in an upmarket central Cairo district wounded two policemen and a passer-by.
AFP
