Veteran politician Beji Caid Essebsi claimed victory in Sunday’s first free presidential run-off vote, seen as the last step in Tunisia’s shift to full democracy nearly four years after an uprising ousted autocrat Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali.

However, bitter rival Moncef Marzouki refused to concede defeat ahead of the release of official results on Monday.

Tunisia’s electoral commission said it would announce official results at 8 p.m. local time (2000 GMT) on Monday.

Victory for Essebsi would enable him to consolidate power with his new secular party, Nidaa Tounes (Call for Tunisia), already controlling parliament after defeating the main Islamist party in legislative elections in October.

Marzouki, a 69-year-old former rights activist, rejected the victory claim and suggested that he would emerge the winner when the official results were released.

Sigma Conseil company’s exit polls, which have consistently matched official results in Tunisia, gave Essebsi 55.5 percent of the vote and Marzouki, the outgoing interim president, 44.5 percent. 

It is the first time Tunisians have freely elected their president since independence from France in 1956.

First round of voting

In the first round of voting in November, the frontrunner Essebsi, a former parliament speaker under Ben Ali, won 39 percent of votes, while the current President Marzouki took 33 percent of the ballots.

On Sunday, polling opened at 8 a.m. local time with a heavy security presence at voting stations around the capital Tunis.

Voters were seen queuing outside many polling stations throughout the day.

With a new progressive constitution and a full parliament elected in October, Tunisia is hailed as an example of democratic change for a region still struggling with the aftermath of the 2011 Arab Spring revolts.

The North African nation avoided the bitter post-revolt divisions troubling Libya and Egypt, but Sunday’s election is between a former Ben Ali official and the incumbent who claims to defend the legacy of the 2011 revolution.

While the moderate Islamist party Ennahda dominated politics immediately after the revolution, they were unable to address the serious economic and political challenges in the country, including extremist attacks.

Essebsi created Nida Tunis, a collection of former regime officials, businessmen and trade unionists to oppose the Islamists and to restore the “prestige of state,” which he said had suffered in the wake of the revolution.

Some material for this report came from Reuters, AFP and AP.
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