CAIRO
By Gamal Said
Polls opened Wednesday in Egypt for the second and last day of a nationwide referendum on the country's amended 2012 constitution.
The constitutional referendum is the first step of an army-imposed transitional roadmap following the ouster of elected president Mohamed Morsi.
The polling centers opened at 9am across the country, following a tense first day which saw deadly clashes between security forces and protesters.
On Tuesday, Morsi's supporters staged several demonstrations against the vote – which they call illegitimate - in several provinces, where security forces attempted to violently disperse them, leaving at least 11 dead.
Egyptian official estimates cited varying voter turnout in the first day of the vote. The highest voter turnout was reported in the central Fayoum province, while the lowest was registered in the border province of Matrouh.
Fayoum governor Hazem Attiyallah put the turnout in the central province at nearly 70 percent of the registered voters.
Hundreds of voters were seen carrying posters of Defense Minister Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, the man widely seen as the architect of Morsi's ouster last year. Others waved Egyptian flags.
Around 53 million Egyptians are eligible to cast ballots at some 30,600 polling centers nationwide.
The constitutional vote is being held amid tight security. The army has deployed some 160,000 soldiers and officers to secure the balloting, while the Interior Ministry has deployed around 220,000 policemen.
The army-installed interim administration has been campaigning for a massive turnout to show popular support for the transitional roadmap.
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