The lawyer of Tunisian presidential candidate Ayachi Zammel said Tunisia's public prosecutor on Wednesday ordered the detention of his client pending trial.
The move comes to reinforce the suspicions of opposition politicians and human rights groups that the presidential elections will not be independent and that its sole goal had become ensuring an easy second victory for President Kais Saied, according to Reuters.
Ramzi Jebabli, the campaign manager of Zammel, said Zammel will be referred to the Court of First Instance next Thursday.
Zammel was arrested on Monday on suspicion of falsifying popular endorsements. He was one of the three candidates approved to run in the election, along with Saied and politician Zouhair Maghzaoui.
The decision to arrest him came two days after Tunisia's electoral commission defied an administrative court ruling to reinstate three prominent candidates in the race.
Rights groups, political parties and constitutional law professors protested, saying the decision was an unprecedented step that raised doubt about the legitimacy and legality of the election in the North African country, expected on Oct. 6.
The election campaign is set to formally begin on Sept. 14 amid calls by critics of Saied on all his election rivals to withdraw from the race, calling the vote a farce.
They said the electoral commission was no longer independent and its sole goal had become ensuring Saied's return for a second term.
But the electoral commission denies such allegations, saying it is just applying the law and is neutral.
Saied, a retired law professor, was democratically elected in 2019, then tightened his grip on all powers in 2021 in a move the opposition described as a coup.
Saied has denied carrying out a coup and said his steps were legal and meant to end years of chaos and corruption. He said last year he would not hand over Tunisia to “non-patriots.”
Businessman Ayachi Zammel is a political activist and the leader of the Azimoun movement. He was a member of the parliament that was ousted by Saied in 2021, before the President extended his powers in a new constitution.
Meanwhile, tension reigns in Tunisia after the country’s electoral commission dismissed on Monday three candidates, despite their having won appeals at the Administrative Court to reinstate them to the race.
The authority justified the dismissal by saying it was maintaining the same list announced on August 10 because “the Administrative Court did not officially communicate its decisions to reinstate the three candidates within the 48-hour deadline according to the law.”
On Wednesday, 26 human rights organizations, including the Tunisian Human Rights League, Lawyers Without Borders, and the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, called for the implementation of the Administration Court’s decisions to reinstate the three candidates to the presidential race.
A day earlier, the Tunisian General Labor Union (UGTT) condemned the dismissal of the three candidates as a “dangerous violation of the law.”
