Polls are open in Tunisia for the second round of voting for parliament, which was largely stripped of its powers during President Kais Saied’s power grab 18 months ago.
Registered voters largely boycotted the first round in December, when the turnout was around 11%.
Correspondents says many Tunisians are frustrated with the president’s political chokehold since a new constitution was put in place last year.
People are increasingly preoccupied by economic stagnation and rising unemployment, leaving many failing to see how electing a largely toothless parliament might improve their lives.
As Tunisia’s president asks voters to approve on Monday a new constitution that gives him greater powers, North Africa analyst Magdi Abdelhadi looks at the man seen by his supporters as a saviour and by his opponents as a usurper of power.
President Kais Saied clearly feels that he is a man of destiny. Although his authoritarian streak is neither unique nor new to Tunisia or the region, his academic credentials and rhetorical style separate him by a long distance from all other Arab autocrats.
Delivering his speeches in impeccable classical Arabic, often adlibbed, at a considered pace, the former law professor conveys a sense of a man who weighs his words carefully, with clear focus and vision and ironclad determination.
Despite mounting criticism both at home and abroad since he assumed total power in Tunisia a year ago, he has continued undeterred to his, and his alone, desired destination. This may very well be part of his appeal to many Tunisians.
Tunisia was the birthplace of the Arab Spring, which saw the overthrow of long-serving ruler Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in 2011.
But after more than a decade of political instability, which saw 10 governments come and go and endless squabbles in parliament, at times degenerating into violence, many Tunisians have simply grown sick of this “democracy”, which brought no tangible improvement to their quality of life.
On the contrary, the economy was in free fall, with all economic indicators pointing in the wrong direction: inflation and unemployment up, foreign debt up, and the value of the Tunisian dinar has plunged.
And things got much worse as the Covid pandemic struck, and even more so after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the impact it had on food and energy prices.
Mr Saied is not against the Tunisian revolution, at least that is what he says in public. Rather, he sees himself as the man of the people, who “corrects” the path of the revolution.
But the word “correction” – tassheeh in Arabic – has a notorious history in Arab politics. It has often been deployed to justify power-grabs.
Characteristically, the leader of “the correction” is motivated by selflessness and a profound sense of the weight of history upon his shoulders. He wants to set history right.
Mr Saied’s constitution enshrines that narrative.
Speaking in the name of the Tunisian people, who have not been consulted in any significant way in its drafting, the draft constitution says: “Out of a sense of profound historic responsibility to correct the path of the [2011] revolution and the path of history itself, that is what happened on July 25 2021.”
That is the day President Saied sacked the government, suspended the parliament and embarked on his single-handed mission to redesign the country’s political future.
Critics say he’s taking Tunisia back to where it was before the 2011 Arab spring – outright autocracy.
We will soon find out whether the Tunisians will endorse that narrative and back Mr Saied’s authoritarianism.
In fact, Tunisians are not alone in expressing disappointment with democracy. Disillusionment with the ability of a democratic system of government to tackle economic hardships is part of a wider trend of perceptions in North Africa and the Middle East.