In an election that was criticised by rights groups, Tunisia’s President Kais Saied has won a second term with more than 90% of the vote, the electoral commission has said.

Only two candidates out of more than a dozen other hopefuls were allowed to stand against President Saied in Sunday’s ballot, where only 29% of the more than nine million registered voters took part.

There were no campaign rallies or public debates, and nearly all the campaign posters in the streets were backing the president.

Saied was widely expected to win after the authorities arrested and jailed dissidents as well as potential rivals, including one of the two challengers on the ballot.

Tunisia was where a wave of pro-democracy protests in the Arab world began in late 2010, ousting long-time autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali early the following year.

The North African country was seen as a beacon of democracy in the region.

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But since Saied was elected on a wave of optimism in 2019, the 66-year-old has suspended parliament, rewritten the constitution and concentrated power into his hands.

“According to preliminary results, Saied received 2,438,954 favourable votes,” the country’s Independent High Authority for Elections (ISIE) said on Monday evening.

Saied’s closest challenger, businessman Ayachi Zammel, won 7% of the vote despite being sentenced to 12 years in prison for falsifying documents, just five days before the poll.

Zouhair Maghzaoui, the third candidate, received nearly 2% of the vote.

Five political parties had urged supporters to boycott the poll fearing that they would not be free or fair.

The final results of the presidential election are set to be announced early next month, according to the electoral agency.

Sunday’s vote was Tunisia’s third presidential election since Ben Ali was overthrown in 2011. He had been in power for over two decades before he was forced to flee to Saudi Arabia following months of massive protests.

Rights group Amnesty International has denounced “a worrying decline in fundamental rights” under Saied’s government as discontent rises over his perceived authoritarian style of governance.

But Saied has rejected the criticism, saying he is fighting a “corrupt elite” and “traitors”.

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