Tunisia: Law professors warn that presidential elections are at risk of losing their legitimacy

Dozens of prominent law professors and deans of Tunisian law schools warned in a statement on Thursday that the presidential election risks losing its legitimacy and credibility if the Independent High Authority for Elections does not return three candidates to the race in implementation of an administrative court ruling.

The statement by the country's elite legal experts puts further pressure on the electoral body, and also reinforces concerns among the opposition and rights groups that the body is no longer an impartial arbiter in the Oct. 6 election.

Last week, the Administrative Court, the highest judicial body that adjudicates electoral disputes, ruled to reinstate three prominent candidates, Mondher Zenaidi, Abdel Latif Al-Makki and Imad Al-Daimi, to the electoral race after the body had previously rejected their candidacy files on the grounds of a lack of popular endorsements.

The conditions for candidacy - according to a new constitution and electoral law - require that the candidate secure endorsements from 10 parliamentarians, 40 elected local officials, or 10,000 voters.

But this week, the body refused to implement the judicial decision, defying the administrative court, and approved only the nomination papers of the current president, Kais Saied, and two others, Zouhair Maghzaoui and Ayachi Zemal.

"The commission is the only body constitutionally authorized to guarantee the integrity of the elections," said Farouk Bouasker, head of the Independent High Authority for Elections.

The decision sparked widespread criticism among parties, activists and rights groups at home and abroad. Al-Zanaidi, Al-Daimi and Al-Makki said they would not acknowledge their exclusion from the race and would continue their legal battle against what they say is “fraud” by a body whose sole aim is to pave the way for Saied to win a second term without difficulty.

Law professors called on the commission to "abide by the court's decision to ensure the credibility and integrity of the electoral process and protect the foundations of the rule of law."

They added in their statement that "the commission's decision puts the electoral process at risk as it affects its credibility, integrity and safety and inevitably leads to questioning the election results."

Election Commission biased towards candidate

In a related context, the Tunisian Ennahda Movement said today, Thursday, that the rejection of the "appointed" (by the authorities) electoral commission of the "final and irrevocable" decisions of the administrative court to reinstate the three candidates is a violation of the law and a violation of the role of the judiciary in electoral disputes and a complete bias towards a specific candidate, in reference to the outgoing president, Kais Saied.

The movement considered the Commission's position in a statement "an attempt to control the results of the elections, which now lack all the elements of freedom, integrity, equal opportunities, and free competition, and an attempt to impose undemocratic elections with known results in advance."

The Ennahda Movement also said that "the authorities' use of state tools and bodies to exclude any serious candidate, restrict members of election campaigns, and intimidate their supporters is an attempt to spoil the electoral climate and undermine all the rules of free and equal competition for candidates in the presidential elections."

She considered that this "clearly reveals the government's fear of free competition that exposes its disastrous failure in managing the country's affairs since its coup against the democratic path and imposition of an individual rule system."

The Ennahda statement condemned the arrest of presidential candidate Ayachi Zemal at dawn on the day the final list of presidential candidates was announced, and the accusations it described as fabricated, including falsifying endorsements and excluding him from the electoral race.

He also called for the release of what he described as political prisoners, and the cessation of all forms of exclusion, and called for continuing the "struggle to restore the democratic path."

On Wednesday, the public prosecutor ordered presidential candidate Zemal detained pending trial, the latest step in what critics have called "maneuvers by the Saied regime" to oust rivals challenging his re-election bid. Police arrested Zemal on Monday on suspicion of forging popular endorsements.

Saied, who was democratically elected in 2019, consolidated his grip on all powers and began ruling by decree in 2021 in a move the opposition called a coup. He said last year that he would not hand Tunisia over to "unpatriots."

Source: Agencies