TUNIS (AFP) - Tunisians voted in general elections hailed as an exercise in democracy by long-time incumbent President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali but denounced as a farce by some of the opposition.
Voting at some 13,000 polling stations across the country began at 7:30 am (0630 GMT) and ended at 4:30 pm (1530 GMT).
Authorities put the turnout figure among the 4.6 million voters at 86.3 percent 90 minutes before the polls closed. Official results were expected Monday.
Though three candidates ran against him, Ben Ali, 68, who has been in power for 17 years, is widely tipped to be re-elected for a fourth term, with critics saying his grip on the country and tight control of the press has effectively crushed any real opposition.
Ben Ali's party, the Democratic Constitutional Rally, is also expected to dominate the legislative elections. The party currently holds 80 percent of seats in parliament.
By law, the country's seven opposition parties -- two of which boycotted the vote on grounds it was not democratic -- are reserved a minimum of 20 percent of seats in the 189-member parliament, whatever their score.
Voters could be seen Sunday lining up outside polling stations in the sun-drenched capital and surrounding areas.
Several women interviewed at one polling station said they planned to vote for Ben Ali as his was the only familiar face among the four candidates.
In the capital's northern suburb of Megrine, voters trickled into a station where a poster of Ben Ali bore down on those casting their ballots.
"It is impossible to find anyone better than him," said Abdel Kader Hanzuti, 60, as he prepared to vote.
Khayat Salah, 55, said he backed Ben Ali for "all the good" he had done the country.
But one man who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals spoke bitterly about the regime, accusing it of stifling dissent.
"I registered to vote but never received my card," he said. "Just now my six-year-old daughter asked me what democracy meant and I was at a loss to answer her."
There were reports that some voters illegally cast ballots for neighbors or friends and in one case a man was seen at a polling station with five electoral cards. He said he was voting for his entire family.
Ben Ali's challengers for the presidency are Mohamed Bouchiha, secretary general of the Popular Unity Party (PUP); Mounir El Beji, secretary general of the small Social Liberal Party; and Mohamed Ali Halouani, standing for Ettajdid (Renewal), which has communist roots.
Bouchiha is related to Ben Ali's wife and has effectively endorsed the president's re-election bid, as has El Beji.
Halouani, who admits he has no chance of winning, is the only candidate to have boldly taken on the head of state denouncing the elections as a farce and calling for a "true democracy".
But his message has failed to reach a wide audience as he is little known in Tunisia. Authorities barred publication of his electoral manifesto because it was deemed too critical of the government.
He dismissed the government's figures on voter turnout Sunday as unreliable and alleged irregularities.
"Nonetheless we will continue our struggle for democracy," Halouani told AFP.
Ayachi Hammami, spokesman for a group of left-wing movements that have grouped under a so-called "democratic initiative", to which Halouani's party belongs, accused the government of rigging the vote.
"They are at this moment falsifying the elections because they are counting the votes in secret with no outside observers or the media present," he said.
The government has rejected such criticism saying that it had gone to great lengths to ensure the transparency of the vote.
But rights groups here and abroad have also described the polls as a "sham" and say the country escaped the kind of criticism heaped on other repressive regimes in the area because its allies -- in Europe and the United States -- tend to focus on Tunisia's sound economic performance and its success in containing radical Islamic activism.
Ben Ali swept to power in 1987 after ousting president-for-life Habib Bourguiba in a bloodless coup. His party has since claimed more than 99 percent of the vote in successive elections.
10/24/2004 - 19:38 GMT - AFP