A day closer to Sunday's elections and dirty tricks are the talk of the papers. After Rached Ghannouchi's declaration yesterday that, "in the event of fraud, we will take the path of revolt and go to the streets with the Tunisian people", reactions are mixed.
On the one hand, Le Temps criticises the An-Nahda leader on its front page for spreading "a message of fear and uncertainty" to voters.
"Today, the priority is to make the first free elections a success and to give them every chance of success by counting ... on the intelligence and the sense of duty of the Tunisian citizen. By reassuring them, first of all, about the steps taken to guarantee the transparency of the election and boosting their confidence to head to the ballot box," it writes. "It is therefore not a good moment to talk of the likelihood of voter fraud three days before the vote when we know that [the electoral commission] and national and international observers are watching closely and that it is no longer possible to exploit the old methods of the past."
The leader in Le Quotidien, however, could not be more different. Comparing Tunisia with Bulgaria (where "the buying and selling of votes is a true national sport"), the paper claims that the election campaign has been riddled with instances of "direct or indirect" vote buying in recent weeks.
"The richer [parties] have not hesitated to fund social projects in the guise of material or food aid to the most needy," it writes, claiming even that weddings have been paid for by these "good samaritans". Without naming any names, it adds: "Those political groupings who don't have such significant financial wherewithal have not stayed out of it either. In order to find favour with the people, they have graciously distributed chicken thighs with chips alongside 5 dinar charge cards for mobile phones."
Questioned about voter fraud in the ballot box, Souad Triki, the vice-president of ISIE, the election body, tells La Presse she does not think there will a big problem. "Personally, I strongly doubt that there will be … many attempts at fraud or double voting," she says. "Identity cards will be thoroughly checked and observers will be at all the polling centres."
Away from politics and the first free elections in its history, Tunisia has another reason to celebrate, La Presse informs us. The national women's team have - with a 13/8 victory over Thailand - won the world championship of pétanque.
