Citizens waiting in lines for their turn to vote in the Egyptian presidential elections of 2024 on Tuesday 12 December, 2023. Al-Ahram.
All subcommittees opened on time except one committee located in Warraq in Greater Cairo, which opened at 10:20am instead of 9am, due to a traffic accident involving the committee's head, Bendari revealed earlier.
Turnout, which was moderate in the morning, was significant through the afternoon across the country, Bendari said.
In a report on Tuesday afternoon, the State Information Service's (SIS) Central Operations Room reported no complaints regarding obstacles faced by international correspondents overseeing the process in hundreds of committees.
Head of SIS Diaa Rashwan revealed in the report that the SIS has been organizing tours for the correspondents of polling stations in various cities and provinces over the three days.
On Tuesday, 17 foreign correspondents, representing 14 foreign media institutions, visited the National Elections Authority (NEA) headquarters to understand how the operations room functions.
In a tour on Monday, journalists visited voting committees in Cairo, Giza, and Qalioubiya. The 15 journalists involved represented 13 institutions from the US, Cuba, Britain, Russia, China, Japan, Iraq, Tunisia, Jordan, and Libya.
On Sunday, 24 journalists from 17 institutions visited committees in North Sinai, including Arish, Rafah, Bir El-Abd, and Sheikh Zuweid.
Last week, the NEA approved 24 embassies, 67 diplomats, and 220 international observers, along with 68 local organizations and 22,340 local observers to monitor the elections.
It also approved 4,218 media observers – representing a wide range of agencies, newspapers, channels, and media outlets – to cover the elections, stated Ahmed Bendari last week.
Polling stations are set to close at 9pm.
On Monday, the NEA executive director said that approximately 45 percent of eligible voters had cast their ballots by afternoon of the second day,
Around 67 million Egyptians are eligible to vote, meaning that over 30 million people had voted by this time.
The electoral process is being supervised by 15,000 judges assigned to 11,631 sub-committees across 9,376 polling stations countrywide.
Voting abroad was held on 1-3 December at 137 Egyptian embassies and consulates across 121 countries.
The NEA will complete the overall vote count by 13 December.
The NEA will accept appeals against its decisions on 14 December, with rulings issued on 15 and 16 December.
It will also announce the final results on 18 December, if no run-off is required.
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