Egyptians Rue Election Day Gone Awry
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
New York Times
December 9, 2005
EZBET AL SHAMS, Egypt, Dec. 8 - It seemed as though the whole village had turned out, hundreds of people packed into a narrow cemetery road to express their sorrow and rage at a funeral on Thursday for Moustafa Abdel Salam, a 60-year-old grandfather who took a bullet in the head and became a fatal footnote to Egypt's parliamentary elections.
The three rounds of voting ended Wednesday in the fertile farming region of the Nile Delta north of Cairo. But the day after was not a day to discuss politics. For the people of this village and others throughout the area it was a day to bury the dead, to pray for the wounded and to curse the government, which they universally held responsible.
Egypt's last round of parliamentary elections ended with eight people dead - including one young man with three bullets in his head, two other men with bullets in their heads - and dozens more with the blunt force injuries that come when rubber-coated bullets and buckshot slam into body parts.
Parents wandered the dark hospital halls in the nearby city of Zagazig on Thursday asking, "Where are the people who were shot?"
If parliamentary elections were supposed to be an exercise in democracy, as President Hosni Mubarak had promised, they instead served as a reminder to many here of the unyielding, unchecked power of the state.
After the banned Muslim Brotherhood began whittling away at the governing party's monopoly on power, police officers in riot gear and others in plainclothes and armed civilians working for the police began blocking polling stations, preventing supporters of the Brotherhood from casting their votes.
Results of the election showed that the Muslim group had increased its representation in Parliament to 88 members from 15, while the governing National Democratic Party retained the vast majority of the 454 seats.
Officials were counting the bodies, too. By day's end, the tally of those killed during the parliamentary elections had risen as other patients died of their injuries.
"There is nothing for us to do," said Hosni Abdel Salam, 55, who said it did not even occur to him to ask the government to investigate the death of his brother Moustafa.
He said he was standing beside Moustafa on Wednesday evening when he said he saw the police fire from a moving police car, killing his brother and injuring eight others on the last day of elections.
Egyptian authorities insist they did not shoot with live ammunition and say security forces were out only to safeguard polling stations.
"There are people who were shot by live ammunition," said a high-ranking Interior Ministry official who asked not to be identified, because he was not authorized to speak publicly. "This is not the security forces that shot them because the Interior Ministry security forces can use tear gas, water pressure and at most rubber bullets if they have to. They do not have live ammunition."
But there are many witnesses, including Western diplomats, rights organizations, doctors, the wounded themselves and people who live here, who say otherwise. They said they had seen police officers open fire on men, women and children with live ammunition, in addition to tear gas and rubber-coated bullets, and held up spent cartridges as proof.
"We know that it is the government who hit him," said Muhammad Saad Muhammad Mehdi, 19, as he stood over the lifeless body of his cousin Muhammad Ahmed Muhammad and a respirator clicked away in Zagazig University Hospital.
A doctor lifted up an X-ray that showed three bullets lodged in back of Mr. Muhammad's brain. The doctor said an ambulance had carried Mr. Muhammad to the hospital after he was caught in gunfire that the police had aimed at crowds they were trying to keep away from the polling booths.
Mr. Muhammad had been on his way home from work as a laborer, his cousin said.
At Zagazig University Hospital, a huge, sprawling complex that serves the entire region, most patients lie on thin mattresses in their street clothes. Muhammad al-Sayed al-Hady, 16, sat facing his grandmother on a hospital bed with meat and cheese spread out on plastic bags between them. He had a large bandage over his left eye where, he said, the police had shot him with a rubber bullet. He said he was trying to get home when he ran into a small army of police officers trying to block people from getting to a polling site.
"The police opened fire on the people," he said in a whisper.
His father, Abu Hamid, said he was furious but was resigned to having no recourse. "The election ended and everyone went back to his business," he said. "Will the police come and apologize? People died."
In another building of the hospital, Abdel Moneim Helal, 32, lay in his street clothes, both eyes swollen shut and the splatter of rubber-coated buckshot on his forehead. He had been trying to vote, he said, when the police opened fire into the crowd.
"When you fire tear gas and bullets into a crowd, and they see children and old people, they don't care," Mr. Helal said.
Dr. Atef Radwan, 53, a professor at the university hospital and a Brotherhood supporter, said he spent three hours trying to vote on Wednesday. He said the police would not let him through.
Finally, he said, men waving machetes chased him, and as he fled uniformed police officers pulled him inside the cordon of officers, where he was beaten by plainclothes policemen. His bloodied and ripped clothing hung from a chair beside his hospital bed. His left leg had been broken in the attack.
"They want to beat the people to not think about democracy anymore," he said.
New York Times
December 9, 2005
EZBET AL SHAMS, Egypt, Dec. 8 - It seemed as though the whole village had turned out, hundreds of people packed into a narrow cemetery road to express their sorrow and rage at a funeral on Thursday for Moustafa Abdel Salam, a 60-year-old grandfather who took a bullet in the head and became a fatal footnote to Egypt's parliamentary elections.
The three rounds of voting ended Wednesday in the fertile farming region of the Nile Delta north of Cairo. But the day after was not a day to discuss politics. For the people of this village and others throughout the area it was a day to bury the dead, to pray for the wounded and to curse the government, which they universally held responsible.
Egypt's last round of parliamentary elections ended with eight people dead - including one young man with three bullets in his head, two other men with bullets in their heads - and dozens more with the blunt force injuries that come when rubber-coated bullets and buckshot slam into body parts.
Parents wandered the dark hospital halls in the nearby city of Zagazig on Thursday asking, "Where are the people who were shot?"
If parliamentary elections were supposed to be an exercise in democracy, as President Hosni Mubarak had promised, they instead served as a reminder to many here of the unyielding, unchecked power of the state.
After the banned Muslim Brotherhood began whittling away at the governing party's monopoly on power, police officers in riot gear and others in plainclothes and armed civilians working for the police began blocking polling stations, preventing supporters of the Brotherhood from casting their votes.
Results of the election showed that the Muslim group had increased its representation in Parliament to 88 members from 15, while the governing National Democratic Party retained the vast majority of the 454 seats.
Officials were counting the bodies, too. By day's end, the tally of those killed during the parliamentary elections had risen as other patients died of their injuries.
"There is nothing for us to do," said Hosni Abdel Salam, 55, who said it did not even occur to him to ask the government to investigate the death of his brother Moustafa.
He said he was standing beside Moustafa on Wednesday evening when he said he saw the police fire from a moving police car, killing his brother and injuring eight others on the last day of elections.
Egyptian authorities insist they did not shoot with live ammunition and say security forces were out only to safeguard polling stations.
"There are people who were shot by live ammunition," said a high-ranking Interior Ministry official who asked not to be identified, because he was not authorized to speak publicly. "This is not the security forces that shot them because the Interior Ministry security forces can use tear gas, water pressure and at most rubber bullets if they have to. They do not have live ammunition."
But there are many witnesses, including Western diplomats, rights organizations, doctors, the wounded themselves and people who live here, who say otherwise. They said they had seen police officers open fire on men, women and children with live ammunition, in addition to tear gas and rubber-coated bullets, and held up spent cartridges as proof.
"We know that it is the government who hit him," said Muhammad Saad Muhammad Mehdi, 19, as he stood over the lifeless body of his cousin Muhammad Ahmed Muhammad and a respirator clicked away in Zagazig University Hospital.
A doctor lifted up an X-ray that showed three bullets lodged in back of Mr. Muhammad's brain. The doctor said an ambulance had carried Mr. Muhammad to the hospital after he was caught in gunfire that the police had aimed at crowds they were trying to keep away from the polling booths.
Mr. Muhammad had been on his way home from work as a laborer, his cousin said.
At Zagazig University Hospital, a huge, sprawling complex that serves the entire region, most patients lie on thin mattresses in their street clothes. Muhammad al-Sayed al-Hady, 16, sat facing his grandmother on a hospital bed with meat and cheese spread out on plastic bags between them. He had a large bandage over his left eye where, he said, the police had shot him with a rubber bullet. He said he was trying to get home when he ran into a small army of police officers trying to block people from getting to a polling site.
"The police opened fire on the people," he said in a whisper.
His father, Abu Hamid, said he was furious but was resigned to having no recourse. "The election ended and everyone went back to his business," he said. "Will the police come and apologize? People died."
In another building of the hospital, Abdel Moneim Helal, 32, lay in his street clothes, both eyes swollen shut and the splatter of rubber-coated buckshot on his forehead. He had been trying to vote, he said, when the police opened fire into the crowd.
"When you fire tear gas and bullets into a crowd, and they see children and old people, they don't care," Mr. Helal said.
Dr. Atef Radwan, 53, a professor at the university hospital and a Brotherhood supporter, said he spent three hours trying to vote on Wednesday. He said the police would not let him through.
Finally, he said, men waving machetes chased him, and as he fled uniformed police officers pulled him inside the cordon of officers, where he was beaten by plainclothes policemen. His bloodied and ripped clothing hung from a chair beside his hospital bed. His left leg had been broken in the attack.
"They want to beat the people to not think about democracy anymore," he said.
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