Al-Jazeera correspondent in Tunisia said that members of the Independent High Electoral Commission stated that the results of the referendum on the draft constitution will be announced this evening, Tuesday, after the vote counting process is completed, while the commission stated that the initial percentage of participation in the referendum on the draft presented by President Kais Saied exceeded 27%.
Al-Jazeera correspondent Maysa Al-Fatnasy said that it was expected that the results of the referendum on the constitution, which took place on Monday, would be delayed until tomorrow, Wednesday.
Counting operations, which began on Monday evening, are continuing in more than 11,000 polling stations, representing the country's total polling stations.
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The head of the Independent High Authority for Elections, Farouk Bouaskar, said that the turnout in the referendum exceeds 27% until the polls close, adding that the percentage is not final.
Bouaskar stated that 2,458,985 voters "were on time" and cast their votes (out of more than 9.32 million voters), pointing out that the percentage "is likely to rise", because some offices outside the country are still open, especially in the American continent ( due to the time difference between it and Tunisia).
Al-Jazeera correspondent in Tunisia, Hafez Merbih, stated that 92% of the voiced votes supported the draft constitution proposed by President Kais Saied, while the rest voted not to approve, according to the Sigma Konsai Foundation for sounding opinions on Monday evening.
Supporters of President Said celebrated the declared rate of participation in the referendum, considering it a success. They raised slogans in this direction yesterday evening, Monday, during a demonstration on Habib Bourguiba Street. The demonstrators visited the Tunisian President, and said that a new phase is going through the country.
Supporters of the Tunisian president demonstrated on Monday night, to celebrate the voter turnout in the constitutional referendum (Reuters)
President's statement
In a speech amid a crowd of his supporters, the President of the Republic said that the first decision after the referendum is to put in place a new electoral law that changes the old form of elections in which the elector does not express the will of the elector.
The Tunisian president presented the new draft constitution as an alternative to the 2014 constitution as part of a road map - announced last July - that ends with legislative elections next December.
On the other hand, opponents of the Tunisian president see the referendum on a new constitution as a play, as "Saeed failed to obtain the approval of the people, as evidenced by the fact that 75% of the voters boycotted the vote."
It is expected that the opposition "National Salvation Front" will hold a press conference this morning, Tuesday, to express its positions towards the referendum on the constitution, and the preliminary results of the percentage of participation in it.
In its first response to the election commission's announcement, the Front issued a statement yesterday, Monday, in which it indicated that "75% of Tunisian voters refused to give their endorsement to the coup path launched by the president, and refused to legitimize his authoritarian draft constitution."
questioning the opposition
The Front questioned the figures announced by the referendum supervising body regarding the actual participation rates.
She described President Kais Saied as "a miserable failure to gain popular support for his coup project," asking him to resign.
The National Salvation Front renewed its adherence to the 2014 constitution as the only reference for the country's constitutional legitimacy.
Five Tunisian parties said that President Kais Saied had violated the electoral silence, and the five parties criticized the president's approach yesterday - on state television - with a word that they described as propaganda for the benefit of the draft constitution presented for a referendum. Lack of independence and fraud in the electoral process.
The five parties that issued the statement are the Ettakatol Party, the Republican Party, the Labor Party, the Democratic Current Party, and the Qutb Party.
The Ennahda movement also expressed its astonishment at what it called the silence of the electoral authority officials regarding what it described as a documented electoral crime, which doubles the doubt about its credibility.
President's propaganda
The Independent High Authority for Audiovisual Communication in Tunisia, known for its acronym "HAICA", said that the program broadcast on Tunisian state television, which included a 15-minute speech by President Kais Saied, had been punctuated by some forms of propaganda for the draft constitution, adding that this constitutes a violation of the chapter. 69 of the Elections and Referendum Law.
The commission sent a letter to the Tunisian state television corporation regarding what it described as a violation of propaganda during the electoral silence period. The head of the Independent High Authority for Elections stated that the commission's board will verify any violation of the electoral silence by President Said, and take the appropriate decisions.
The referendum on the new draft constitution comes at a time when Tunisia is experiencing a political crisis and intense polarization that has continued since President Said began imposing his exceptional measures in July 2021.
Tunisian forces announced their rejection of the draft constitution, considering that the exceptional measures in general represented a “coup against the 2014 constitution,” while other forces announced their support for the draft constitution, and considered that it contained many gains compared to the 2014 constitution, and represented, with the rest of the exceptional measures, “a correction of the course of the 2011 revolution.” .