Egyptians line up to make history

Egyptians have made history with millions of people queuing up outside polling stations for a presidential election that many hope will end more than five decades of successive dictatorships.

Long lines of voters began snaking out of schools and colleges on Wednesday night (NZT), as ordinary Egyptians turned out to cast their ballot in what is still very much an open race to elect a successor to Hosni Mubarak, who was ousted by last year's revolution. If there is no outright winner there will be a run-off on June 16-17.

"This is a new experience for all the Egyptian people," said Abdel Halim, a 52-year-old who was voting in the ramshackle west Cairo district of Imbaba. "We are going to choose a new man to become our leader - and we have never done that."

Around 50 million people are eligible to vote in the poll - the first genuinely democratic presidential election in the nation's history. But the stakes could not be higher. Victory for any of 13 candidates will pose serious questions about the future of a country that Egyptians like to call "the mother of the world".

Whatever the result, it will trigger a ripple effect washing over sensitive areas of policy - from the 1979 peace treaty with Israel, which Islamist and leftist candidates intend to review, to reform of the police and security services.

And the victor will have to contend with a military establishment that is reluctant to cede privileges to any future civilian administration.

"I feel great, but at the same time I'm very worried," said Mohamed Shiha, an estate agent whose ambivalence epitomised the anxieties that many Egyptians are carrying into this election. Shiha was casting his vote in Zamalek, an upmarket island on the Nile where only Cairo's wealthiest residents can afford to live. "I am a liberal and I think Egypt needs a liberal president. We cannot give all the powers to the Islamists."

Egypt's new Parliament is dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, once a rigidly disciplinarian force that is increasingly divided between a conservative leadership and more reformist elements. Its presidential candidate, Mohammed Morsi, is considered one of the main frontrunners.

In a show of strength yesterday, microbuses were seen shuttling female Brotherhood supporters to polling stations in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria. Yet the prospect of the organisation controlling the presidency and Parliament has caused alarm among some voters - particularly within the minority Christian community - who fear the growing clout of political Islam.

Shiha said he was voting for Amr Moussa, Mubarak's former Foreign Minister whose campaign has appealed to many voters growing wary about the Muslim Brotherhood. Moussa, who has been cast as the frontrunner in opinion polls, is a secular candidate whose robust denunciations of Israel made him so popular that an Egyptian crooner penned a hit song about him in 2001.

Yet his rise - along with that of former Air Force chief Ahmed Shafiq - has left some voters aghast. Many young activists who helped spearhead the uprising believe the election of a former Mubarak official would be a huge step backwards.

But millions of voters went into polling day undecided. Layma Kamel, a consultant for Moussa's campaign, said internal polling showed that 30 per cent of voters had not made up their minds.

- Independent