Egypt's parliament urges Sisi to run again for president

CAIRO, Jan. 9 (Xinhua) -- The majority of Egyptian parliament members, some 74 percent, signed on Tuesday a recommendation form urging President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi to run for a second presidential term.

The form recommending Sisi was signed by Parliament Speaker Ali Abdel-Aal and 463 other lawmakers, as the parliament's general secretariat dedicated 12 committees for lawmakers to recommend presidential hopefuls until the candidacy period for the 2018 presidential elections is over.

Egypt will hold its 2018 presidential race from March 26 to 28, the 10-day candidate registration will start on Jan. 20, the electoral campaigns will kick off on Feb. 24, and the result of the first round will be announced on April 2, according to the country's National Election Authority.

The parliament's recommendation is based on an article in its regulations that allows each parliament member to recommend only one candidate for the post of president.

Only those presidential candidates getting at least 20 recommendations from lawmakers are granted a recommendation paper from the parliament that they can include among their registration papers.

A pro-Sisi non-official campaign called "So That You Can Build It (Egypt)" said last December that it collected over 12 million signatures of Egyptians, more than 11 percent of the population, supporting Sisi to run for a second presidential term.

Sisi took office in mid-2014, a year after he led the ouster of his Islamist predecessor Mohammed Morsi in July 2013 in response to mass protests against Morsi's one-year rule and his now-outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group.

Sisi said in November 2017 that he will not seek to change the constitutional limit of two four-year presidential terms, thus ruling out a third presidential term for himself after a possible second one.

Although he has yet to formally announce his candidacy for the 2018 election, Sisi is widely expected to do so and to earn a landslide victory due to the absence of competitive challengers in the presidential bid.

Egyptian rights and opposition lawyer Khaled Ali announced in November last year his intention to join the presidential race. However, there is a possibility for Ali's disqualification as he had received a suspended three-month jail term earlier in September over an obscene hand gesture he reportedly made after winning a court order challenging the government.

On the other hand, former Air Force Commander and former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq, who fled Egypt after narrowly losing to Morsi in the 2012 elections, announced from the United Arab Emirates his intention to run for president.

However, Shafiq came back to Egypt last December and announced his withdrawal from the presidential race on Sunday. Enditem