Hundreds of Assiut Oil Refinery workers demonstrated outside the office of the chairman of the board today. They are protesting against being prevented from leaving before the end of working hours to vote in this week's runoff elections, although they had earlier been given permission Mohammed al-Shuwaikh, a manager at the company, said, "We were surprised to be prevented from going out although the board had given us permission to leave work early to vote, as we did in the first phase of elections.” “It was necessary for many workers to leave early as their electoral districts are far away, which led the workers to protest since we had been permitted to leave early to elect National Democratic Party members before the revolution," he said, referring to Egypt's formerly ruling party.