TUNIS, Tunisia

Only 25% of Tunisia’s registered voters took part in the July 25 referendum on President Kais Saied’s proposed new constitution, the director of polling institute Sigma Conseil said late Monday.

Speaking on Tunisian public television, Hassan Zargouni also said that 92.3% of the participants voted in favor of the draft constitution.

Zargouni highlighted that "nearly 75% of Tunisian voters did not participate in the ballot."

Polling stations for the referendum closed Monday evening.

The country's electoral board, however, said the voter turnout was 27.5% of the eligible voters.

Polling stations opened at 6 a.m. local time (0500GMT).

According to the Independent High Authority for Elections, over 9 million people were expected to take part in the referendum.

Meanwhile, Saied accused parties -- without naming them -- of creating a crisis to distract people from real issues in the country.

In a statement while heading for a polling station in the capital Tunis, he vowed to hold the parties accountable and to bring them to justice.

He also asked Tunisians to cast their votes on the constitution and not to leave Tunisia for those who, according to him, work against it, whether inside or outside.

"We will start together a new history based on the responsibility of the official in front of the people who elected him," Saied said.

Later in the day, the Independent High Authority for Elections announced that so far, 1.21 million voters, or 13.6%, had participated in the referendum as of 3.30 p.m. local time (1430GMT).

The authority’s president, Farouk Bouasker, said the voting process is underway "naturally," affirming that "voters are free to vote yes or no."

He stated that after 10 p.m. local time (2100GMT), the polling centers turn into vote counting centers.

Tunisia has been undergoing a severe political crisis since July 25, 2021, when Saied sacked the government and suspended parliament.

Tunisian forces consider these measures a "coup against the constitution," but others see them as a "correction of the course of the 2011 revolution," which overthrew then-President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Saied, who started a five-year presidential term in 2019, considers his measures necessary to "save the country from imminent danger."

*Vakkas Dogantekin in Ankara contributed to this story