Egypt extends presidential vote by extra day

Egypt's presidential election commission Tuesday decided to extend the two-day presidential voting period for an extra day, making it three full days of polling in the country, state-run news agency MENA said.

"The purpose is to give the opportunity for a large number of voters to cast their votes and also to give a chance for non-resident voters to return to their original provinces to cast their votes," Xinhua reported.

The government had officially announced the second voting day as a public day off to increase the participation in the polls.

Meanwhile, the election commission cancelled the extra hour it decided earlier to extend for the second voting day.

Former military chief Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, who led the overthrow of former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, is poised to score an easy win over his sole rival in the race, Leftist leader Hamdeen Sabahy, who came third in the 2012 presidential election.

The former military chief won 94.5 percent of the votes cast by over 300,000 overseas Egyptians in 124 countries last week.

About 54 million people are eligible to cast their votes in around 14,000 polling stations across the country's 27 provinces.