Crunch Time as Tunisians vote in Presidential Runoff

Local Editor

Four years on their revolution, Tunisians heads to the polls Sunday in a presidential runoff featuring two candidates presenting stark choices for Tunisia's future.

Tunisians must decide Sunday between veteran octogenarian politician Beji Caid Essebsi and Moncef Marzouki, a 69-year-old former human rights activist who is the outgoing interim president.

Following an October 26 parliamentary vote and the first round of the presidential election last month, this marks the third time in just two months that Tunisians are heading to the polls.

This time, the stakes are high. Under Tunisia's new constitution, the president will be responsible for security, defense and foreign affairs.

The run-up to Sunday's vote was marked by a bitter campaign that saw both candidates engage in mudslinging, racking up old and new fears in a country that has survived a difficult transition period.
Essebsi, who leads the Nidaa Tounes party, won 39.46% of the vote in last month's first round while Marzouki took 33.43%.

Nidaa Tounes won the October parliamentary elections, beating the Ennahda party. If Essebsi, considered the frontrunner, wins Sunday's election, his party would effectively control all levers of the government. Should Marzouki win, it would set up an inevitable collusion course between parliament and the presidency.
Ennahda did not field a candidate in the presidential poll in the interest of "national unity" and in the interest of "Tunisian democracy," according to Ennahda party chief Rachid Ghannouchi.

But that has not stopped Essebsi from warning that Marzouki represents the extremists and a vote for the former human rights activist represents a vote for Ennahda.
Marzouki in turn accuses Essebsi, who served as a senior official in previous Tunisian regimes, of wanting to restore the old guard deposed in the revolution.
Sunday's vote then is set to be a bitter battle between two men representing opposing ends of the political spectrum.

Sunday's election comes four years after an itinerant fruit vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi immolated himself in the town of Sidi Bouzid. His death sparked protests against the corrupt, autocratic Ben Ali regime, which then spread across the Arab world.
With a population of just 11 million people, the country has the dubious distinction of being the largest source of foreign extremist militants joining the ranks of the "ISIL" group in Syria and Iraq, according to government and independent monitoring figures. The unemployment rate also hovers around 16 percent, with youth joblessness almost double that and rising even higher in rural areas.

In a video posted Thursday, extremist leader Abou Mossaab called on Tunisians to boycott the polls, saying the authorities "are turning you into infidels with these elections".

The government, which has been on alert since October, will be deploying tens of thousands of troops and police to guarantee security during the vote.
Meanwhile, in the restive, mountainous Chaambi region near the Algerian border, Tunisian troops have mounted a military campaign against extremist hideouts amid fears that the militants are building ties with Algerian branches of AQIM [Al Qaeda in the Maghreb].

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team