Tunisians continue to vote on a new draft constitution that grants broad powers to President Kais Saied. While the turnout reached 12% of the total voters 7 hours following the start of voting, according to the electoral commission, opposition parties accused the president of violating the law, and voting operations faced criticism for preventing observers from entering polling stations.
This morning in Tunisia, voting began in the referendum on the constitution, while the voting of Tunisian expatriates entered its third and final day.
More than 11,000 polling stations inside the country will be open to more than 9 million Tunisian voters, according to Farouk Bouaskar, head of the Independent High Authority for Elections.
Bouaskar said that the turnout rate, 7 hours following the polling stations opened, reached 12% of the registered voters.
Prior to that, the President of the Elections Authority spoke of an important and encouraging participation, with 560,000 votes cast 3 hours following the polling stations opened.
The voting began at six in the morning local time and ends at ten in the evening (from 5 in the morning until 9 in the evening GMT), which is the longest election day in Tunisia.
It was not clear when the results would be announced following the voting ended, but analysts expect a yes vote with a low turnout due to the apparent lack of enthusiasm for the vote.
President Said – when he voted today – accused unnamed parties of trying to thwart the referendum, calling on voters not to respond to those who tempt them with money, and said that these parties are working to prevent Tunisian citizens from participating in the referendum and obstructing their will to build a new republic.
accusations and criticism
In a joint statement issued today, 5 opposition parties, the Republican, the Ettakatol, the Democratic Current and the Workers’ Pole, accused President Saeed of violating the electoral silence and attacking his opponents.
The five parties affiliated with the “national campaign to drop the referendum” said that these abuses reflect what they described as the fake nature of this referendum.
She criticized the president’s speech today, which she described as propaganda in favor of the draft constitution that is being submitted to a referendum.
The five opposition parties considered that the commission’s silence on what the president had done was evidence of its lack of independence and the fraud of the electoral process and the results that would result from it.
The Secretary-General of the Republican Party, Issam Chebbi, had previously considered that President Kais Saied had broken the electoral silence in front of the polling station, in reference to the media statements made by Saied following casting his vote, in which he accused the parties calling for a boycott of the referendum of betraying the people and fearing their will.
Al-Shabi added that the electoral commission, which he described as the position, remained silent, stressing that what was built on falsehood is false, as he put it.
On the other hand, the Tunisian Association for the Integrity and Democracy of Elections (ATID) said that a number of observers were prevented from carrying out their mission to monitor the progress of the referendum process.
The association demanded that the election commission intervene quickly and circulate the information of the observers’ accreditation certificates to its assistants and allow them to perform their supervisory role. It confirmed that there was a delay in the start of the polling process in more than one center, in addition to restricting a number of its observers and preventing them from moving between the centers.
In the same context, the “Shahid” Center for Election Observation said that observers were prevented from entering and moving between a number of polling stations, and violations were recorded that would harm the essence of the electoral process.
On the other hand, the official spokesman for the electoral authority in Tunisia, Mohamed Al-Tilili Al-Mansri, indicated that what he described as a small problem regarding the monitors occurred, saying that it had been bypassed.
In turn, the Tunisian Journalists Syndicate said that some journalists were prevented from covering inside polling stations and information was withheld from others, and it talked regarding security obstacles and harassment of Tunisian and foreign journalists while covering the referendum.
The vote is taking place on the one-year anniversary of Said’s actions, following he dissolved the elected parliament, overthrew the government, imposed a state of emergency and began ruling by decree.
The referendum is the second stop of the roadmap announced by President Saeed, which he said aims to get the country out of its political and economic crises, and will be completed by holding parliamentary elections on December 17.
Under Said’s referendum rules, there is no need for a minimum level of participation to pass the new constitution. These rules only require it to take effect once final results are published and do not say what will happen if voters reject it.
Said praised his steps as the basis for a new Tunisian republic to put the revolution back on track and end years of political rigidity and economic stagnation, while his opponents accuse him of a coup.
Although almost all major political parties and civil society organizations condemned his unilateral approach to rewriting the constitution and the legitimacy of the referendum, it failed to build a united front.
This was evidenced by the protests once morest Saied in recent days, with the Islamist Ennahda party, the largest party in parliament, participating in a protest on Saturday.
Civil society institutions and small parties organized a protest on Friday.
On the other hand, a party supporting the absolute rule that existed before the revolution organized protests on both days.
Only a small number of people participated in the protests, but the gatherings organized by Saeed’s supporters also witnessed only a modest attendance.
Most Tunisians are still focused on the deteriorating economy and high prices.
Among the 3 parliamentary and presidential elections that have taken place twice since the 2011 revolution once morest former President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the lowest participation rate was 41% in 2019 for the council that Said dissolved.
And any turnout much lower than this rate – today, Monday – might raise more questions regarding the legitimacy of Said’s new constitution and his project to reshape Tunisian politics.
The new constitution and the 2014 constitution
The new constitution approved by the referendum constitutes a break with the constitution of the revolution, which was approved in 2014 and established a revised parliamentary system.
The new constitution clearly recognizes the presidential system, and not only did the president have defense and foreign powers as stipulated in the 2014 constitution, but expanded to include, beyond that, the powers of appointing the government and judges and reducing the previous influence of Parliament.
The President of the Republic has the right to appoint the head of the government and the rest of its members upon a proposal from the Prime Minister, and the constitution authorizes him to dismiss them without Parliament having a role in that.
The President, the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, has the power to set the state’s general policy and determine its basic choices, and his legal projects have “priority consideration” by parliamentarians.
In addition, the legislative function is divided between the “Council of the People’s Representatives” whose deputies are elected by direct vote for a period of five years, and the “National Council of Regions” which includes elected representatives from each region, provided that a law is subsequently issued defining its tasks.
The establishment of this council falls within the framework of President Qais Saeed’s vision of decentralizing the decision and that solutions to marginalized areas that lack development must be proposed by the people.
In addition, the president accepts the resignation of the government following submitting a censure bill approved by a two-thirds majority of the two councils combined, and this is difficult to achieve and allows him to be the first decider of the fate of any government.
The constitution did not include provisions for the dismissal of the president, contrary to what was stated in the 2014 constitution. In return, it gives him the right to dissolve parliament and the National Council of the regions.
The president appoints judges following their nominations were submitted by the Supreme Judicial Council, which judges considered an “interference in the independence of the judiciary.”
