Tunisia Beji Caid Essebsi Declared Officially Elected President

The candidate of the secular alliance, Beji Caid Essebsi, won the presidential election in Tunisia , according to the final results of the second round published by the Independent High Authority for the Elections (ISIE).

Later in the afternoon of Monday 22 December, the outgoing president, Moncef Marzouki, called his victorious rival for the compliment , as his campaign manager.

Mr. Caid Essebsi, 88, received 55.68% of the vote, more than 1.7 million votes, against more than 1.3 million for his rival (44.32% of the votes), announced the president of the ISIE, Chafik Sarsar. The participation rate reached 60.1% of registered voters.

First democratically elected president since the country’s independence in 1954, Beji Caid Essebsi will see its powers largely limited by the new Constitution, to the government, which should lead his troops.

The camp of one who was Minister of deposed dictator Ben Ali, Nidaa Tounès (“Call of Tunisia”) had already claimed victory on Sunday after the close of polling stations. Faced with nearly 2 000 people gathered outside his campaign headquarters, Beji Caid Essebsi, 88, was then thanked his constituents and praised his rival, though the enmity between the two men is well known.

Winner of the parliamentary October 26, Nidaa Tounès managed to dethrone the very strong Islamist party Ennahda, which had won the bet in parliamentary elections in 2011. And will this title to head the next government, probably as part of a coalition.

Former companion of Bourguiba, the father of independence, Mr. Caid Essebsi has managed to embody for any part of the Tunisians, tired by four years of instability, the promise of a restored order.

And the first real alternative to the Islamists whose passage to the government (2011-2013) was a trauma to a part of the population . Mr. Essebsi has resisted multiple attempts businesses by Moncef Marzouki during the campaign to portray as a representative of the deposed Tunisian dictatorship.