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1st LD: Egypt's parliamentary polls to kick off on Oct. 18

Xinhua, August 31, 2015 Adjust font size:

Egypt's long-awaited parliamentary polls will kick off on Oct. 18, the head of the election committee told a press conference on Sunday evening.

The elections will be held in two stages covering the country's 27 provinces. The first stage covering 14 provinces will be held on Oct. 18 and 19, while the second covering the rest 13 provinces on Nov. 22 and 23, said Judge Ayman Abbas, head of the Supreme Committee for Elections.

The elections outside the country will start a day earlier in each stage.

"The committee will start receiving candidacy applications from Sept. 1 and will continue for 12 days," Abbas told the attendees.

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi said in mid-August that the country will have a new parliament by the end of 2015, which has been confirmed by the head of the election panel.

Egypt has been without a parliament for about three years, as the last one which was elected in late 2011, months after the ouster of long-time leader Hosni Mubarak, was dissolved in June 2012 by a court order.

President Sisi, who as the army chief then removed former Islamist President Mohamed Morsi in mid-2013 in response to mass protests, is currently holding the country's legislative authority in the absence of a parliament. Endit