We officially have a two-horse race for the presidency: Al Ghad Party head Moussa Mostafa Moussa submitted yesterday his papers to enter the presidential race as the sole competitor to President Abdel Fattah El Sisi, Ahram Gate reports. Although his name had only surfaced on Sunday as a potential contender, Moussa apparently collected 47,000 citizen endorsements and 26 signatures from MPs, he told AFP Arabic. El Sisi, who submitted his documents last week, has collected signatures from over 500 MPs and nearly 1 mn citizens.

The window for would-be candidates to submit their documents to the National Elections Commission closed at 14:00 yesterday, and the NEC will announce the two-person list on Wednesday after validating their paperwork, Al Masry Al Youm reports.

El Sisi will release the details of his campaign strategy and presidential program once the NEC releases the final list of candidates, campaign spox Mohamed Abu Shoka said at a presser yesterday. Abu Shoka had previously said he would present El Sisi’s plans for his second presidential term at the press conference.

You can catch Abu Shoka presser in full here (runtime 2:01:16).

Moussa’s eleventh-hour entry is raising eyebrows over whether he will pose any real competition to El Sisi or whether he was drafted to ensure the elections are pluralistic after lawyer Khaled Ali dropped out and former military chief of staff Sami Anan was arrested. Al Ghad had previously endorsed El Sisi’s bid for a second presidential term “and even organised events to help nominate the former military commander as recently as last week,” Reuters notes. Moussa also had a photo on his personal Facebook page declaring his support for El Sisi as Egypt’s president, but has since removed it, according to the newswire. However, Moussa maintains that his bid is serious, and told Ahram Gate that he plans to support youth’s economic empowerment by offering them high-paying employment options and extending loans to finance their SMEs. Other main features of his presidential program include reopening idle factories, spurring investment in Egypt, and encouraging Egyptians to invest in Africa.

The global business press tore into Moussa’s presidential bid, which the Wall Street Journal’s Jared Malsin says is “a move that poses a token challenge to the incumbent [president] in an election campaign opponents are calling a sham.” His entry in the race came as the authorities “have appeared to be scrambling for a contender to run against Mr Sisi” and prevent “an embarrassing one-horse race,” Heba Saleh writes for the Financial Times. Moussa being viewed that way could be just what the doctor ordered for the government, which wants to ensure that El Sisi is re-elected but must take into account “a public that wants to believe Egypt is a democracy, after all the political costs they have paid since [the Arab Spring revolution of] 2011, analysts tell Edward Yeranian tells VOA’s Edward Yeranian. The Guardian and The New York Times also have coverage.