CAIRO: The former Egyptian military chief Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi has won the country’s presidential election by bagging more than 90 percent of votes, according to partial results.
However, turnout remained around 44 percent despite the fact that the election was extended to a third day after not many people showed up at the polling stations.
The leftist politician Hamdeen Sabahi, who was the only candidate running against Sissi in the election, secured 735,285 votes. Sissi bagged 23.38 million votes.
Sissi has been widely regarded as Egypt’s de facto leader since he toppled the first democratically-elected President Mohamed Morsi in July last year and cracked down on his Muslim Brotherhood.
The Muslim Brotherhood boycotted the presidential election and said that holding the election will not give legitimacy to the criminal, in an apparent reference to the former military chief Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi.