Tunisia Election Results: A crisis of confidence in Democracy

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The Tunisia election affirmed president Kais Saied as the country’s supremo. But the voter turnout can give him no confidence in his reformist agenda. A voter turnout of 11 percent of eligible voters in the Tunisian election is a repudiation, but of what? Even this figure is up from the December’s first round of voting, which attracted a paltry voter turnout of 8 percent. It barely qualifies as a democratic election.

Saied’s presidency is the nadir of the once-hopeful democratic process that began with the Jasmine revolution of 2011, a popular uprising against corruption, poverty, and repression that resulted in the resignation of then-president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. This triggered the Arab Spring throughout parts of the Middle East and North Africa. Were the promises of the Jasmine revolution have been fulfilled, there would not have been such discontent and apathy among the electorate.

In the months preceding the elections, President Kais Saied’s actions have left him open to accusations of carrying out a coup. Saied was a popular candidate who rose to power on a ticket of beign able to get things done in the background of infighting between political parties and within governing structures. The people were frustrated at the political and bureaucratic gridlock in the midst of a pandemic-related economic downturn. He sacked government and froze parliament, ushering in what he called “an exceptional period” during which he would rule by decree. This would allow him to unilaterally set policy, appoint cabinet, and set aside parts of the 2014 Tunisian constitution. When the parliament met in a plenary to end this so-called “exceptional period”, President Saied then dissolved the Tunisian parliament in defiance of Article 80 of the Tunisian constitution. He labeled the actions of parliament a “failed coup de e’tat”. Members of Parliament were then summoned for questioning by state security. The fact that no arrests were made, or no charges were filed alludes to the fact that Saied, a former Constitutional law professor, knows that any accusations against the MP’s are without foundation. Saied then began a consultative process to revamp the Tunisian constitution, but without the participation of major political and civil society groups.

Saied’s constitution passed in a referendum with a paltry 30.5 percent voter turnout, which conferred on him almost unchecked powers.

Finally, he sacked dozens of judges in a power move that would see him kneecap the judiciary, the last line of defence against autocratic rule.

Given this authoritarian political culture, where lawmakers are questioned by security police, judges are summarily dismissed, and the constitution of Tunisia, a beacon of the Arab Spring, wilfully misinterpreted and twisted to suit his agenda, it is no surprise that calls for a boycott were heeded. Twinned with the culture of fear and recrimination, the electorate had no incentive to show up at the polls.

These are some of the factors that created an overwhelming confluence of non-consent in the electoral process. Almost all of them sit squarely on the shoulders of Saied. Democracy is fragile and even the merest rolling back the democratic gains of the Jasmine revolution has set back constitutional democracy in the Arab world by many years.

The youth who brought about the Arab spring are now speeding into their middle years and advanced maturity. A little over a decade later, a President who suspends constitutional democracy, sets the security police on elected officials, sacks the judiciary, and almost unilaterally rewrites the constitution was not an ideal that they would have fought for.

There is no paradox in the assumptions that Saied remains tremendously popular among his base, in the aftermath of an election that had a single-digit voter turnout. But voter apathy cannot squarely be only attributed to Saied alone. The economic crisis in Tunisia has worsened, and the usual champions of austerity, the IMF, have dictated their demands. Participation of youth in the Arab spring has not necessarily translated to youth participation in politics.

While the issues are complex, the fact of the matter is that a voter turnout in the single digits can never be described in good faith as a sign of a healthy democracy. How Saied and the rest of Tunisian polity and civil society respond to this crisis in the legitimacy of the Tunisia election will dictate whether the Arab Spring has truly run dry at its source.