Ennahda won 90 seats in the 217-seat assembly, which will draft a constitution, form an interim government and schedule new elections, most likely in early 2013. The Islamists’ nearest rival, the secularist Congress for the Republic, won 30 seats
Ennahda has told secularists around the world that it will respect women’s rights and would not impose a Muslim moral code on Tunisian society.
Ennahda leader Rachid Ghannouchi, a soft-spoken Islamic scholar who spent 22 years in exile in Britain, said: “We salute Sidi Bouzid and its sons who launched the spark.
“We will continue this revolution to realise its aims of a Tunisia that is free, independent, developing and prosperous in which the rights of God, the Prophet, women, men, the religious and the non-religious are assured because Tunisia is for everyone.”