Tunisians continue to vote in the referendum on the new draft constitution, amid a limited voter turnout, and while organizations complained about preventing observers and journalists from entering polling stations, the electoral commission promised to look into all abuses, after opposition parties accused President Kais Saied of violating the electoral silence.

The voting began at six in the morning local time and ends at ten in the evening (from five in the morning until nine in the evening GMT), which is the longest election day in Tunisia.

More than 11,000 polling stations have been allocated inside the country for more than 9 million Tunisian voters, according to the head of the Independent High Authority for Elections, Farouk Bouaskar, and in parallel, Tunisians abroad continue to vote for the third day.

Bouaskar said that the participation rate reached 13.6% (one million and 213,000 votes) until 3:30 in the afternoon, about 10 hours after the start of the voting.

Bouaskar had spoken in the first hours of the referendum about an encouraging and important participation.

There were no queues at the polling stations, and youth participation was limited, according to local media.

Elections authority spokesman Mohamed Al-Tilili Al-Mansri said that vote counting will begin after polling stations close at ten in the evening.

The referendum took place amid a sharp debate over the content of the new draft constitution, and in light of a boycott by opposition political forces, most notably the Ennahda Movement, which was the major force in the dissolved parliament.

The vote is taking place on the one-year anniversary of Saeed's actions, after he dissolved the elected parliament, overthrew the government, imposed a state of emergency and began ruling with decrees.

The referendum is the second stop of the road map 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 rules for the referendum, there is no need for a minimum level of participation to pass the new constitution. These rules only require that it come into force once final results are published, and do not say what will happen if voters reject it.

Saeed said after casting his vote that he will soon issue a new electoral law (European News Agency)

accusations and complaints

The first hours of the referendum witnessed complaints and accusations of irregularities.

In a speech that lasted about 15 minutes and was broadcast by public television - on a day when electoral silence is supposed to prevail - Tunisian President Kais Saied accused parties - he did not name - of trying to thwart the referendum.

Said said that these parties are working to prevent Tunisian citizens from participating in the referendum and to obstruct their will to build a new republic, as he put it.

Saeed also called on voters not to respond to those who tempt them with money, and indicated that he would soon issue a new electoral law.

The Ennahda movement condemned Said's statements, and considered them a flagrant violation of the electoral silence period.

The movement considered - in a statement - that these statements are an additional indication of the shamness of the referendum, and said that the silence of the electoral authority officials on this "electoral crime" doubles the doubt about its credibility.

Five other opposition parties, namely the Republican Party, the Ettakatol, the Democratic Current, the Labor Party and the Pole, accused President Saeed of violating the electoral silence and attacking his opponents.

In a joint statement, 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 added that the commission's silence on what the president did is evidence of its lack of independence and the fraud of the electoral process and the results that will result from it.

Bouaskar called on voters to vote massively (European News Agency)

Handling abuse

On the other hand, spokesman for the Independent High Authority for Elections in Tunisia, Mohamed Tlili Al-Mansri, said that the authority will look into all statements and abuses, regardless of their source, without any embarrassment.

Al-Mansri added that the electoral law applies to everyone, noting that the authority works under the supervision of the Administrative Court.

For its part, the Independent High Authority for Audiovisual Communication in Tunisia (known for its acronym Haika) said that the program broadcast by Tunisian state television - which included a speech by President Kais Saied - was punctuated by some forms of propaganda for the draft constitution.

The commission added that this is a violation of Article 69 of the Elections and Referendum Law, and directed an accountability to the Tunisian State Television Corporation for what it described as a violation of propaganda during the electoral silence period.


Observers and journalists

Earlier on Monday, the National Syndicate of Tunisian Journalists called on the Independent Electoral Commission to intervene and the Ministry of the Interior not to place illegal obstacles to the work of journalists.

The union said - in a statement - that it recorded security restrictions and harassment of Tunisian and foreign journalists while covering the vote on the new constitution.

She added that some heads of polling stations prevented Tunisian and foreign journalists from filming the voting process inside the polling stations, which hindered their work.

The Journalists' Syndicate recorded the reluctance of some heads of subsidiary bodies to provide journalists with information about the progress of the referendum process and related data.

Several civil organizations concerned with monitoring the elections had recorded several observations regarding the progress of the voting process on the new draft constitution. The Monitoring Network said that 91 polling stations did not record the presence of any representative of the parties participating in the campaign, and that about 9% of the offices were opened. late than scheduled.

For its part, the Tunisian Association for the Integrity and Democracy of Elections "Atid" announced that a number of observers had been prevented from carrying out their mission of monitoring the progress of the referendum process.

The association demanded that the election commission intervene quickly and allow its members to perform their oversight role, and confirmed a delay in the start of the polling process in more than one center, in addition to restricting a number of its observers by preventing them from moving between centers.