TUNIS, Tunisia Dec. 13 (SPS) — Tunisia’s new assembly chose a veteran rights activist Monday as the country’s first democratically elected president.
Moncef Marzouki of the Congress for the Republic Party on Monday became interim president with 153 out of 217 votes in the assembly, with three voting against, two abstentions and 44 blank ballots cast as a protest vote by some members.
Marzouki is expected to appoint a prime minister from the moderate Islamist Ennahda Party, whose ruling coalition also includes the left of center Ettakatol Party. The new prime minister then has 21 days to form a government.
The prime minister and the government he forms also are in effect temporary until the country holds a round of post-constitutional elections.
Once the government is formed, the assembly will turn its attention to writing the country’s new constitution and preparing for presidential, legislative and local elections.
Marzouki, who succeeds interim President Fouad Mebazzaa, will be Tunisia’s fourth president since its independence from France in 1956. (SPS)
NEWS AGENCIES / 062