Since Gamal Abdel Nasser ascended to power in 1956, three presidents ruled Egypt until the revolution in 2011. The three presidents were somehow elected in each election consecutively, leaving no other option for the Egyptian people.

The country faced a brutal autocracy until the people became encouraged enough to topple the latest president Hosni Mubarak. Leaving a short era, in which a democratically elected president led the country, Egypt apparently, is going to witness a pre-revolution era election in the upcoming one in March, as the candidates have been arrested or excluded from the race, making the current President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi the only candidate.

Former Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Shefik, at the beginning of this month, said he was not going to run for presidency, contrary to expectations. He had been considered to be the strongest rival to el-Sissi.

"My absence of more than five years perhaps distanced me from being able to very closely follow what is going on in our nation in terms of developments and achievements, despite the difficulty of the conditions. I have seen that I will not be the ideal person to lead the state's affairs during the coming period. Thus I have decided not to run in the upcoming 2018 presidential elections," Shefik said, yet some abroad-based Egyptian media outlets claimed he was afraid to run for presidency.

Former military Chief of Staff Lieut. Gen. Sami Anan, who had announced his candidacy last week, was arrested shortly afterward. An army statement read on state TV said Anan's presidential bid amounted to "a serious breach of the laws of military service," because as a military officer he was required to end his service and seek permission before seeking office," a Reuters report said last week.

Anan was considered to be the only remaining opposition figure against el-Sissi. Similarly, Mohamed Anwar al-Sadat, the nephew of former President Anwar al-Sadat, said he did not want to run for presidency, as there was an atmosphere of fear in the country and a legal case against him. Khaled Ali, who was very critical of el-Sissi over his policies in the Nile and relations with the Gulf, has been barred from registering as candidate with a claim that he had missed the deadline.

According to Egyptian law, any candidate needs to receive approval from the army. When considered that el-Sissi was the army chief before leading a bloody coup in 2013, his influence within the army is very high and decisive on giving approval.

Even during the Mubarak era, other candidates were allowed to run for office, although the result was clear in advance. However, el-Sissi seems to be going into the election as the only candidate. The possibility of single-candidate election drew harsh criticism on social media while some Egyptian media outlets implicitly warned el-Sissi not to follow this path, as the country's image abroad is already awful.

"But el-Sissi appears to see little danger of a public backlash, or a serious rebuke from his allies in the West, who once urged democratic reforms. The overwhelmingly pro-el-Sissi media depict him as the only figure able to solve Egypt's problems, and the president himself often says the need to rebuild the country outweighs concerns of democracy and rights. A significant sector of the population likely agrees with the argument — though how much is unknown, since authorities prevent most polling and have outlawed all unauthorized protests," an Associated Press report said over the weekend.