By Esma Ben Said
TUNIS
A senior member of the "Call of Tunisia" party said Monday that the Islamist Ennahda movement had become the North African country's "former regime."
Feras Qurfash, a member of Call of Tunisia's media committee, said his party had become Tunisia's "strong party," noting that it had emerged as the winner of parliamentary elections held Sunday.
Qurfash expected the number of Ennahda members to decline in coming days, even though the core of the movement would remain solid, depending on the families of former political prisoners.
On Sunday, millions of Tunisians voted in the country's first parliamentary poll since the 2011 revolution that swept long-serving president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali from power.
A total of 217 parliament seats were up for grabs in the poll, including 18 seats earmarked for Tunisians living abroad.
The "Call of Tunisia," which includes a number of Ben Ali-era politicians, won 84 seats in the assembly, while Ennahda won 69 seats, according to an Anadolu Agency tally.
The results came as a surprise to many local and foreign observers, given that Ennahda had won a majority of seats in Tunisia's constitution-drafting assembly in a 2012 vote following Ben Ali's ouster.
On Monday, Qurfash expressed confidence that the head of his party, Beji Caid Essebsi, would also win Tunisia's presidential election, slated for November 23.
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