70% Voter Turnout in Tunisia in 1st Post-Revolution Polls

Tunisians formed snaking queues in the sun to vote in their first free election Sunday, basking in their status as democratic trail-blazers nine months after ousting a dictator and giving birth to the Arab Spring.

The Islamist Ennahda party was predicted to win the most votes but fall short of a majority in a new 217-member assembly that will rewrite the constitution and appoint a president to form a caretaker government.

Long lines of happy people formed at polling stations before dawn, growing into winding queues of voters keen to take part in the country's first electoral contest without a pre-determined result, after decades of autocratic rule.

Turnout neared 70 percent some two hours before polls were due to close, elections chief Kamel Jendoubi said, adding that while early results could start coming through on Monday, official results were due on Tuesday.

"The turnout of Tunisians exceeded all expectations," he added.

Voter Houcine Khlifi, 62, had tears in his eyes as he spoke of finally casting his ballot after spending a sleepless night in excited anticipation.

"Tunisia today offers the world a bouquet of flowers of liberty and dignity," he told Agence France Presse at a central Tunis polling station.

"On this day, I vote in memory of my husband who gave his life for our dear country, our liberty," 63-year-old Rbiaa Dalhoumi said through her tears after voting in the western town of Kasserine which bore the heaviest brunt of the government's brutal crackdown on the revolution that ousted dictator Zine el Abidine Ben Ali.

Samel Bouazizi, brother of fruit seller Mohammed Bouazizi whose self-immolation sparked the revolution, cast his first democratic vote in the southern town of Sfax at the age of 31.

"All night, I thought of my brother Mohammed who was the source of the great event we are experiencing today and thanks to whom Tunisians are voting freely," the carpenter told AFP.

"His sacrifice was not in vain. We have continued his work and I am proud to be Tunisian today."

Some 7.2 million people out of just over 10 million citizens were eligible to vote for a new constituent assembly in 12 hours of polling that started at 07.00 am (0600 GMT).

The assembly will decide what system of government the country will have and how to guarantee basic liberties, including women's rights which many fear Ennahda would seek to diminish despite its assurances to the contrary.

It will also have the authority to write laws and pass budgets.

Ennahda claims to model itself on the ruling AKP party in Turkey, another Muslim-majority country which like Tunisia to date has a secular state, but is accused by some of preaching modernism in public and radicalism in the mosques.

Tunisia's progressive left remains divided before Ennahda, however, with party leaders having failed to form a pre-vote alliance.

In a sign of the tension between Islamists and secularists, Ennahda leader Rached Ghannouchi was heckled after voting in a Tunis suburb, with queuing voters shouting "degage (leave)!" while calling him a "bastard" and a "terrorist".

"This turnout demonstrates the people's thirst for democracy," Ghannouchi, until recently in exile, said with a smile.

The electoral system was designed to include as many parties as possible, a scenario that may lead to a divided assembly and complicate its work of constitution drafting, expected to take a year, ahead of fresh national elections.

Ennahda is likely to seek a post-poll coalition with smaller parties to give it a bigger say.

Sunday's vote is the first run by an independent electoral body after decades of ballot stuffing by the interior ministry.

Jendoubi lamented that some political parties broke a blanket campaign ban that entered into force on Saturday, allegedly sending mobile phone messages in a bid to influence voters.

Michael Gahler, head of the European Union observer mission, told AFP: "Up to now, it (the election) is very positive. The people are calm, happy, patient."

The European Union hailed Tunisia's elections and vowed support for the new authorities, while British Prime Minister David Cameron said: "As the first country in the region to put democracy to the test at the polling booth, Tunisia is once again leading the way."

Ben Ali was ousted in January after 23 years of iron-fisted rule, in a popular uprising that sparked region-wide uprisings which claimed their latest Arab strongman Thursday with the killing of Moammar Gadhafi of Libya.

In polls witnessed by some 40,000 security force members and 13,000 observers, Tunisians could choose from more than 11,000 candidates -- half of them women by law -- representing 80 parties and thousands of independents.

Vote counting will start as soon as polling stations close at 7.00 pm (1800 GMT), with results updated throughout the night.

The current, interim government will remain in power until the assembly appoints a new president, not expected before November 9.