Tunisia approves 27 presidential candidates

The Independent High Authority for the Election announced that it approved the candidacy documents of 27 persons and rejected 41 applicants for the upcoming presidential election.

Speaking at a press conference in the capital, Tunis, the authority’s head Shafik Sarsar said that 27 applications were accepted, noting that the commission exerted much effort to verify the recommendations provided in the applications in a short period of time, although some voices had sought to cast doubt on its ability to accomplish that task.

Sarsar noted that 80 observers and officers verified 800,000 recommendations.

Among the information the commission had to verify, Sarsar pointed out, was the candidates’ relationship with those who recommended them.

“We were surprised to receive a massive number of complaints after we published, on the authority’s website, lists of the names of those who signed recommendations so as to enable voters to verify their signatures,” he added.

He noted that the authority referred complaints about possible fraud in recommendations to the General Prosecution to decide on them.

Sarsar called on those who signed recommendations to file complaints at the General Prosecution if they notice that there are violations so as to fight electoral fraud.

The commission also accepted 1,327 electoral lists in the parliamentary election, including 1,230 lists inside Tunisia and 97 abroad.

The Tunisian Constituent Assembly passed a law setting

Parliamentary elections as set to take place on October 26 while the first round of presidential elections will take place on November 23, with the possibility of holding a second round after the first round’s results have been announced, before the end of 2014.