Tunisia.. Administrative Court orders implementation of its decision to reinstate 3 presidential candidates

The Administrative Court in Tunisia called on the electoral commission to implement the court’s decision to re-list 3 presidential candidates rejected by the commission.

This comes as the presidential election campaign in Tunisia began today, Saturday, and will continue for 21 days until October 4, before the elections are held on the 6th of the same month.

In statements to Anadolu Agency, the spokesman for the Administrative Court, Faisal Bouguerra, confirmed that "the court sent a letter to the Election Commission yesterday, Friday, on the necessity of implementing the judicial decisions related to announcing the final list of candidates and re-listing the three candidates," without further details.

These three are: Abdellatif Mekki, Secretary General of the Action and Achievement Party (opposition), Mondher Zenaidi, a former minister under President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali (opposition), and Imad Daimi, Director of the Office of former President Moncef Marzouki (opposition).

On September 2, the High Elections Commission announced that it had finally accepted only 3 presidential candidates out of 17 candidacy files, which means rejecting the Administrative Court’s rulings to return 3 others to the presidential race.

The head of the authority, Farouk Bou Askar, said in a press conference: “President Kais Saied, Ayachi Zemmal (Azemoun Movement - opposition), and Zouhair Maghzaoui (People’s Movement - supporter of Saied), whose candidacies were approved on August 10, are the only ones finally approved for the presidential elections.”

He added that "it was not possible to view copies of the rulings issued by the general session of the Administrative Court within 48 hours of the date of their issuance, despite the authority's request for those rulings," according to Tunisian state television.

Bouaskar refers to the court’s rulings accepting the files of three candidates whose candidacy had previously been rejected by the Election Commission, on the grounds that their files were incomplete. They are Al-Maki, Al-Zanaidi, and Al-Daimi.

Source: Anadolu Agency