THIS WAS NO SECRET: EL-SISSI WINS ELECTION BY LANDSLIDE

CAIRO (AP) — With nearly all votes counted, Egypt's former military chief has won a crushing victory over his sole opponent in the country's presidential election with more than 92 percent of the votes, according to results announced by his campaign Thursday. The interim president said turnout reached 46 percent.

But the turnout figure raised questions of the vote's integrity after the state — following widespread reports of empty polling stations during the scheduled two days of voting — abruptly added a third day to beef up the numbers.

The victory by retired field marshal Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi was never in doubt, but the career infantry officer had pushed for a strong turnout to bestow legitimacy on his ouster last July of Egypt's first freely elected president, the Islamist Mohammed Morsi.

In a statement Thursday, Interim President Adly Mansour declared that legitimacy had been achieved. He put turnout at 46 percent and said it showed "a broad consensus" for the political roadmap transition set by the military after Morsi's ouster. He said the voting was free of any "serious misconduct."

That rate is lower than the 52 percent turnout in the 2012 presidential election that Morsi won — and lower than the bar el-Sissi himself set in his last campaign interview, when he said he wanted more than 40 million of the country's 54 million registered voters to cast ballots so he can "show the world" his support.

Islamists, once the country's most powerful political machine, had called a boycott of the vote, as had some more secular "revolutionary" youth groups. Still, el-Sissi can genuinely claim he comes into office with an impressive vote tally — his campaign said he won 23.38 million votes. That's significantly more than the 13 million that Morsi won two years ago. His sole opponent, leftist politician Hamdeen Sabahi, received 736,000 votes, less than the 1.03 million invalid ballots cast, according to the figures.

After polls closed, several thousand el-Sissi supporters celebrated in Cairo's Tahrir Square, birthplace of the 2011 uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak. They waved Egyptian flags, el-Sissi posters and danced. There were similar celebrations in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria and a string of other cities north of the capital and in the oasis province of Fayoum southwest of Cairo.

But the unusual measures taken by the government to drum out voters raised skepticism over the extent of support. The first day of voting saw reports of a meager 15 percent turnout, prompting officials to declare the next day a public holiday to get people to the polls, while threatening fines on those who didn't vote. On the extra, third day, bus and trains were free to allow people to return to home districts and cast ballots.

Sabahi protested the extension, saying it aimed to "distort" the will of the people. His campaign pulled its representatives from polling stations Wednesday in protest against what it called a campaign of intimidation and arrests of its campaign workers.

Sabahi's spokesman, Hossam Moenis, told ONTV network that a member of the campaign has been referred to a military tribunal. "We are digging a channel for democracy ... in the face of an undemocratic project," he said. "The same mentality that we thought we managed to topple on Jan. 25, is back and ruling," — a reference to the start of the 18-day, anti-Mubarak uprising in 2011.

Critics said the lack of enthusiasm at the polls was in part due to apathy among even el-Sissi supporters, knowing that his victory was a foregone conclusion. Others said it showed discontent with el-Sissi, not just among his Islamist foes but also among a broader section of the public that believes he has no concrete plans for Egypt's woes and fears he will return Egypt to the autocratic ways of Mubarak.

The measures to increase voter numbers were also startling because el-Sissi was not expected to need any help. The government and media had been whipping up adulation for el-Sissi over the past 10 months, depicting him as a warrior against terrorism and the only person able to tackle Egypt's economic problems, high unemployment, inflation and instability.

El-Sissi's supporters in the Egyptian media have been in a panic the past two days. Political talk show hosts and newscasters urged people to vote, warning that otherwise the Brotherhood will be encouraged to step up its challenge to the new government.

Prominent TV talk show host Amr Adeeb angrily said that by not voting, Egyptians might as well "go directly to the prison and return Mohammed Morsi to power." U.S.-based Democracy International, which had been observing the vote, said the extension "raises more questions about the independence of the election commission, the impartiality of the government, and the integrity of Egypt's electoral process." It largely ended its observer mission as scheduled after two days, though European Union monitors stayed on.

Only a handful of voters, or none at all, were at polling centers in multiple districts toured by Associated Press reporters Wednesday. At some, music played and kids painted Egyptian flags or el-Sissi's name on their faces but only the occasional voter drifted in. TV images beamed from more than a dozen locations across Egypt showed similar scenes.

"People are lazy, depressed or frustrated. They knew what the result will be even before the vote," said Amani Fikry, a manager in a privately-owned company. "They are exhausted from three years of constant troubles."

WHERE IS THE HONOUR IN KILLING ?

HONOUR KILLING IN PAKISTAN: Pakistan woman stoned to death by family for marrying man she loved

LAHORE Pakistan (Reuters) - A 25-year-old woman was stoned to death by her family outside one of Pakistan's top courts on Tuesday in a so-called "honor" killing for marrying the man she loved, police said.

Farzana Iqbal was waiting for the High Court in the eastern city of Lahore to open when a group of around dozen men began attacking her with bricks, said Umer Cheema, a senior police officer.

Her father, two brothers and former fiance were among the attackers, he said. Iqbal suffered severe head injuries and was pronounced dead in hospital, police said.

All the suspects except her father escaped. He admitted killing his daughter, Cheema said, and explained it was a matter of honor. Many Pakistani families think a woman marrying her own choice of man brings dishonor on the family.

Iqbal had been engaged to her cousin but married another man, Cheema said. Her family registered a kidnapping case against him but Iqbal had come to court to argue that she had married of her own free will, he said.

Around 1,000 Pakistani women are killed every year by their families in honor killings, according to Pakistani rights group the Aurat Foundation.

The true figure is probably many times higher since the Aurat Foundation only compiles figures from newspaper reports. The government does not compile national statistics.

Campaigners say few cases come to court, and those that do can take years to be heard. No one tracks how many cases are successfully prosecuted.

Even those that do result in a conviction may end with the killers walking free. Pakistani law allows a victim's family to forgive their killer.

But in honor killings, most of the time the women's killers are her family, said Wasim Wagha of the Aurat Foundation. The law allows them to nominate someone to do the murder, then forgive him.

"This is a huge flaw in the law," he said. "We are really struggling on this issue."

ONE NIGHT STAND WOMEN

Women with wide hips 'more likely to have one night stand'
Shape of a woman’s body may play an important role in a woman's decision to have sex because women with wider hips find childbirth less traumatic

They have long been known as ‘child-bearing hips’. Now, a new study has revealed that women with wide hips are more likely to have one-night stands and more sexual partners in general.

The study, carried out by scientists at Leeds University, found the shape of a woman’s body may play an important role in a woman's decision to have sex because women with wider hips do, in fact, find childbirth less traumatic.

Women with smaller hips therefore tend exhibit more cautious sexual behaviour as a result, the study suggests.

Dr Colin A Hendrie, Associate Professor of Human and Animal Ethology at Leeds University was the lead author of a study into how a woman's build influences her sexual behaviour, published in Springer's journal Archives of Sexual Behavior.

The researchers defined wide hips as those wider than 14.2 inches (36 centimetres) and small hips as those under 12.2 inches (31 centimetres wide).

This is measured by the distance between the upper outer edges of the iliac crest bones of the pelvis.

The 148 women in the study - aged between 18 and 26 - also had their hip circumference at the widest point measured and their waist circumference at its narrowest point.

All the women in the study had at least one sexual partner previously. They also completed a questionnaire about their sexual histories, including the age at which they lost their virginity, the number of sexual partners they'd had, and information about emotionally significant sexual relationships they had had.

The researchers found women who were more inclined to have one-night stands had wider hips.

More specifically, the women for whom one-night stands accounted for three out of every four of their sexual relationships had hips at least 0.8inches (2cm) wider than those who had fewer one-night stands.

The researchers suggest that women with wider hips have more sexual partners because the birth process is generally easier and less traumatic (than for smaller-hipped women)

Dr Hendrie said: “Women's hip width has a direct impact on their risk of potentially fatal childbirth-related injury. It seems that when women have control over their own sexual activity this risk is reflected in their behaviour.

“Women’s sexual activity is therefore at least in part influenced by hip width.”

He explained the study findings relate back to how humans learned to walk upright and the subsequent development of narrower hips to make it easier to walk.

In the process, female hips have become just wide enough to allow childbirth. Infants are born at a less developed stage than most other primates because of this restriction, and therefore need much more care and investment after birth from their mothers and father, they say.

“We found that women with smaller hips tended to have, throughout their entire sexual histories, just a couple of sexual partners. They really only had sex with people in the context of relationships, demonstrating a more cautious sexual strategy. If they got pregnant there would be someone in their life to help them.

“Women with large hips also had a couple of relationships over that same time frame but also had a lot more one night stands. These young women would be having seven or eight one night stands over the entire time,” he said.

The team found the average age of virginity being lost was 16 and there were extremes at either end, with some women admitting to a couple of hundred sexual partners.

“The other important thing is that this study is not reflecting what men find attractive, it is about women being in charge of their own destinies, where they can control their own sexual behaviour,” Dr Hendrie said.

SOURCE: Telegraph

TIDAL WAVE OF BEER

Pep Guardiola gets hit with a tidal wave of beer, drops the Bundesliga trophy

Though Bayern Munich won the Bundesliga title in record time back in March, the celebration was saved until after their final match of the season against Stuttgart. Claudio Pizarro gave them a little something extra to celebrate by scoring in added time to give Bayern a 1-0 win they didn't need. And once the final whistle blew, it was time for the traditional victory beer showers.

Since this was manager Pep Guardiola first beer shower experience, his players did not go easy on him. He defiantly stood up to them with the trophy hoisted over his head as they blasted him in the face. Pep has plenty of experience lifting trophies, but the addition of flying beer to the mix was apparently too much for him to handle (literally), so he dropped the trophy on the ground. Lucky for him, it was made in Germany (probably).

Pictures:

                Pep also served up a few beer showers himself, though.

DRE BILLIONAIRE

Dr Dre set to be hip hop's first billionaire as Apple is set to buy Beats Electronics for $3.2bn

Super producer and rapper Dr Dre is set to become Hip Hop's first billionaire as Apple Inc. is close to sealing a multi-billion dollar deal to purchase Beats Electronics, the company he founded with music producer Jimmy Lovine in 2008. The company produces the popular Beats By Dre headphones and also runs a music streaming service, which Apple is more interested in than the headphones itself. If this happens, it will be Apple's biggest acquisition till date. ($3.2billion)

Apple wants a music-on-demand service to rival Spotify, which is a digital music service that gives people access to millions of songs.

It was announced today that the acquisition could be announced as early as next week.

Last night, singer Tyrese posted a video where Dr Dre proclaimed himself the first billionaire in Hip Hop. Dr Dre is currently worth $550million. See the video after the cut...

In the video, Tyrese said: 

"Billionaire boys club for real, homie. The Forbes list just changed.… Sh*t just changed!” 

 Dr Dre added:

 “The first billionaire in hip hop, right here from the motherf*cking West Coast!” 

Watch the video below...