Tunisian President Kais Saied on Friday assigned himself the power to appoint the head of the electoral commission.
Saied, according to an official decree, will now have the power to name three of the seven members of the electoral commission, known by its acronym ISIE, including its president.
The former law professor, elected in 2019 amid public anger against the political class, sacked the government on July 25 last year.
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The election commission, created in 2012, has currently nine members with its president appointed by parliament.
Saied dissolved parliament last month.
ISIE’s current president, Nabil Baffoun, is a critic of Saied and has warned that any change in the commission composition by presidential decree would be “unlawful.”
Last month, Saied inaugurated a “temporary” council of judges to replace an independent watchdog he abolished.
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