Speaking late on Saturday, opposition Salvation Front chief Nejib Chebbi called for a political transition, with presidential elections and a national dialogue.
Protests against Saied have at times drawn more than 10 000 demonstrators but have more often been in the hundreds and the opposition remains fragmented.
Questions over legitimacy may become a problem for the president as his government wrestles with implementing unpopular economic reforms such as subsidy cuts to secure an international bailout of state finances.
The economy shrank by more than 8% during the COVID-19 pandemic and the recovery has been slow. Some basic foodstuffs and medicines have disappeared from shelves and ever more Tunisians are braving the dangers of an illicit Mediterranean crossing to seek a new life in Europe.
PARTIES ABSENT
The political parties that dominated the previous parliament, elected in 2019 with a turnout of about 40%, have accused Saied of a coup for his shutdown of parliament last year and say he has instituted a one-man rule.
Under Saied’s new electoral law, which he passed by decree, political parties would have had a far smaller role in the election even if they had taken part. Party affiliation was not included on ballot papers next to candidate names.
The electoral commission head Farouk Bouasker, who announced the turnout figure, described it as “modest but not shameful”, ascribing it to the new voting system and a lack of paid election campaigning.
At one polling station, voter Faouzi Ayarai had said she was optimistic about the new parliament. “These elections are an opportunity to fix the bad situation left by others over the past years,” she said.
But I Watch, a non-governmental watchdog organisation formed after the 2011 revolution, said the new parliament had been “emptied of all powers”.
With the main parties absent, a total of 1 058 candidates, only 120 of them women, were running for 161 seats.
For 10 of those, seven in Tunisia and three decided by expatriate voters, there was just one candidate. A further seven of the seats decided by expatriate voters had no candidates running at all.