Two Days, Two Votes, Two Continents, Two Futures

This weekend, two elections are being held, in countries separated by just a few hundred miles but which may as well be poles apart. On each vote the short-term future of a continent may rest.

Today, Egyptians began voting to finally choose a successor to President Hosni Mubarak, more than 16 months on from the revolution that toppled him after 30 years of authoritarian rule. Their choice is between Mubarak’s last prime minister, and a figurehead of one of the world’s most influential Islamic political movements.

Tomorrow, the people of Greece get another chance not only to elect their country’s lawmakers, but also effectively to cast their verdict on whether the country should remain in the Eurozone. To do so would mean more austerity; to exit would cause chaos across Europe. The favourites promise to avert both dangers – this would probably end up delivering both.

With Egypt at the forefront of northern Africa’s democratic awakening and Greece at the heart of Europe’s troubles, both continents are holding their breath, as new eras look set to be defined. The stakes are high – but how did it come to this?

In Egypt, the saturation of the middle ground in the first round of voting diluted the support of one of the pre-election favourites, Amr Moussa, opening the door for Ahmed Shafiq to win through to this weekend’s run-off against Mohammed Mursi.

Until earlier this week, Mr Mursi looked all set to follow up the Muslim Brotherhood’s success in last winter’s parliamentary elections by defeating a man whose very eligibility for the election was in doubt due to his links to the former regime.

However, Thursday’s judgements by Egypt’s Constitutional Court – that the law that would have prevented Mr Shafiq from standing was invalid, and to dissolve the fledgling parliament because the rules governing the election were flawed – have blown the race wide open and created huge uncertainty about what powers the new president will have.

The drafting of a new constitution has been abandoned for now – paralysing the judiciary – and there will be no legislature for the new executive to oversee. No wonder turnout today has been much lower than expected – no-one has any clear idea exactly what it is they are electing.

In Greece, by contrast, the implications of tomorrow’s vote could hardly be starker. The radical Syriza party claims that Greece can stay in the euro whilst rejecting the terms of the bailout, but few believe this is possible. Syriza’s stance exploits the fact that a majority of Greeks want to abandon the conditions of the bailout, while (separately) most are in favour of keeping the Euro. But the consensus is that Greece simply cannot have both.

If Syriza’s main opponents, the conservative New Democracy party, can convince enough voters that maintaining the status quo is the lesser of two evils, Europe will breathe a sigh of relief. If it cannot, the likely result is another hung parliament, more weeks of wrangling, more crippling uncertainty across the continent – and Greece running out of money as the bailout funds dry up.

Some argue that Greece must stay in the Eurozone for its own sake and that of its neighbours; others see no reason to continue to pander to Brussels bureaucrats, and advocate an exit as an opportunity to rebuild the country’s economy on its own terms – notwithstanding the inevitable currency devaluation and spiralling inflation.

To stick with the old establishment or to chart a brave new course – it’s a choice that Greece is not alone in facing this weekend.