Tunisian government wins parliament’s confidence vote

The new government of Tunisia led by Prime Minister Habib Essid has won confidence vote of the country’s parliament.

The coalition government, which includes ministers from the premier’s secular Nidaa Tounes party and the Islamic party, Ennahda, was approved by lawmakers on Thursday with 166 votes in favor, 30 against and eight abstentions.

Parliament speaker Mohamed Ennaceur said the confidence vote on the North African country’s new cabinet was won by “a comfortable majority” in 217-seat legislature.

The Tunisian prime minister presented his program to the parliament on Wednesday, focusing on securing the country against terrorism and containing inflation.

Essebsi garnered 55.68 percent of the votes to overcome former president, Moncef Marzouki, who collected 44.32 percent of the ballots, in the run-off of December 21, 2014.

The premier’s earlier attempt to form a government, consisting of just his own Nidaa Tounes and one other party was scrapped following speculations that he would lose the vote.

Tunisia, the birthplace of pro-democracy protests across North Africa and the Middle East, revolted against the Western-backed dictator, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, in 2011.

According to the UN figures, more than 300 people were killed and hundreds injured in the security forces’ crackdown on popular protests that led to Ben Ali’s ouster.