Ennahda, which had a long history of opposition here before Mr. Ben Ali eviscerated it a decade ago, is widely expected to fare the best, and no one pretends that it owes its popularity only to its financial clout. Its moderate and modern brand of Islamic politics has struck a chord with many Tunisians. 
 
 But for months, it has been at the center of attacks from liberal rivals and liberal-leaning election officials who accuse it of taking foreign money, mainly from the Persian Gulf. Islamist groups from Egypt to Lebanon are widely believed to rely on such support from the wealthier and more conservative gulf nations, but the charges have resonated especially loudly in Tunisia, in part because regulators have sought to stamp it out. 
 
 “Everybody says that Ennahda is backed by money from the Arabian gulf,” said Ahmed Ibrahim, the founder of the liberal Democratic Modernist Pole coalition, calling the outsize influence of foreign money a threat to Tunisia’s “fragile democracy.” 
 
 Though Ennahda’s sources of financing have not been disclosed, its resources are evident. The first party to open offices in towns across the country, Ennahda soon blanketed Tunisia with fliers, T-shirts, signs and bumper stickers. Unlike other parties here, it operates out of a gleaming high-rise in downtown Tunis, gives away professionally published paperbacks in several languages to lay out its platform, distributes wireless headsets for simultaneous translation at its news conferences and hands out bottled water to the crowds at rallies. 
 
 Ennahda party members have sponsored local charitable events like a recent group wedding for eight couples in the town of Den Den, or giveaways of meat for the feast at the end of Ramadan. 
 
 Alarmed at the flood of money, the commission overseeing the political transition sought last June to impose rules limiting campaign spending, banning foreign contributions and even barring candidates from giving interviews to foreign-owned news media, a move thought to be aimed mainly at thwarting the potential of the Qatar-owned network Al Jazeera to favor Ennahda candidates. 
 
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 In response, Ennahda withdrew its representative on the commission. Party officials have variously said that they pulled out because the commission was overstepping its authority, or that the restrictions curtailed their ability to reach Tunisians in expensive precincts abroad. But members of the commission say Ennahda objected only to the restrictions on foreign fund-raising. 
 
 “I believe it was because they rely on foreign funds,” Latifa Lakther, vice president of the commission, who acknowledged a personal bias against the party. “It is logical. They have a lot of money, and they left because of that law concerning financing.” 
 
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 Ennahda officials say they have followed the rules, which apply only to the final weeks of the campaign, and they deny any foreign financing. The accusations about gulf money are “completely baseless,” the party’s founder, Rachid Ghannouchi, said last week at a news conference. After supporting itself for 40 years of oppression and exile, he said, his party now counts members of the Tunisian elite among its donors. Moreover, he added, his moderate and democratic Islamic politics have hardly endeared him to the gulf autocracies; he is barred from Iran and Saudi Arabia. 
 
 Other party officials, though, have acknowledged that party members directed contributions from the gulf to charitable efforts, like helping Libyan refugees. “Ennahda is a social phenomenon before it is a political party,” said Said Ferjani, a member of its political bureau, adding that in the future the group planned to divide its social service work more clearly from its political activities to clear up any impression of a benefit to its candidates. 
 
 Ennahda’s supporters, for their part, point to Slim Riahi, founder of the Free Patriotic Union party, which election officials say has been another one of the biggest spenders here. An expatriate businessman who made an oil fortune in Libya, Mr. Riahi has no history in politics, scant history in Tunisia and no discernible ideology. His party’s best-known candidate is the former soccer star Shokri Waa. Asked whether the party was better described as center-left or center-right, a spokesman said, “Center-center.” 
 
 “There was a political void that Ben Ali left, and we saw that many political parties were going to take advantage of this to manipulate the Tunisian people,” said Fouad Maatook, a co-founder of the party, explaining its creation. 
 
 In an effort to shake his party’s reputation as a rich man’s plaything, Mr. Riahi recently dropped by a Tunis slum in his chauffeured Porsche Cayenne, making a videotaped visit to the home of Aouiha Mimouni. Elderly, nearly deaf and unable to remember her own age, she was sitting on a frayed mattress on the cement floor of her dark, unheated room. 
 
 After he left the building, Ms. Mimouni said she had no idea who he was or why he had come. 
 
 Ennahda’s main rival, the Progressive Democratic Party, has also advertised heavily on billboards around the country in a full Western-style political campaign rivaling Mr. Riahi’s. In the final rallies, the party’s leaders publicly thanked but did not name the Tunisian businesspeople who it said had paid for its lavish campaign. 
 
 But Tunisian radio programs have carried testimonies of former party members who said they defected because of its financial reliance on people who profited under Mr. Ben Ali’s corrupt government. And as the party’s lead candidate, a lawyer in a well-worn glen-plaid suit, tried to hand out fliers on the streets of the hard-pressed town of Kasserine, some said they doubted the party’s credibility. 
 
 “All these guys are ex-R.C.D.,” Hasan Guermit, 24 and unemployed, referring to the former governing party. “They come to the martyrs’ neighborhood to get out votes, but then they will turn against us.” He said he was leaning toward Ennahda. ||||| Hassene Dridi, AP 
 
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 TUNIS, Tunisia -- Gunfire rang out Sunday in central Tunis near the Interior Ministry, as police and troops try to calm tensions after the president's ouster.Issam Chebbi, a senior member of the main opposition party PDP, said a gunfight also broke out Sunday between security forces and unidentified attackers in front of the opposition party headquarters. A big crowd was gathered in front of the building and heavy security was deployed in the area.Soon afterward, repeated volleys of gunfire were heard nearby, near the Interior Ministry. The source of the shots was unclear.The violence broke out as Tunisia sped toward a new future after its iron-fisted leader fled. A new interim president ordered the country's first multiparty government to be formed.But violence in many parts of the capital heaped doubt on hopes for a smooth transition to a new era.The omnipresent posters of ex-President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali were coming down, a vivid signal to citizens that Tunisia is moving on after 23 years of autocratic rule. Even the main state TV station changed its name.For Tunisians who protested for four weeks - with police shooting dozens to death - the announcement that a "government of national unity" would be formed opens the possibility of a leap toward democracy in this Muslim country in North Africa whose modernity clashed with Ben Ali's repressive rule.The nation must wait 60 days to see whether the party that maintained the ex-leader in power gets an upper hand in the new government, locking the old system back in place.The 74-year-old Ben Ali fled his country Friday for Saudi Arabia, literally chased out by angry legions of citizens protesting joblessness, corruption and lack of freedoms - a first for an Arab country. Numerous citizens laid a large measure of blame for his fate on his in-laws, supremely wealthy and considered just as corrupt.The interim president, Fouad Mebazaa, the former president of the lower house of parliament, was named Saturday - the second change of power in fewer than 24 hours. He quickly ordered the creation of a unity government that by its nature would include the opposition which had been frozen out under Ben Ali."We can start to hope," said a founder of the main opposition party, the Progressive Democratic Party, Nejib Chebbi. The question now, he said, is whether a new government will be pluralistic or again dominated by Ben Ali's ruling RCD party. "If the RCD is dominant, we're not out of the woods."The Tunis airport reopened Saturday but the state of emergency declared Thursday continued. Instability ruled in the streets and spotter helicopters churned in the sky above the capital.Fire blackened the main Tunis train station, torched along with large stores and scattered shops as troublemakers defied a curfew Friday night.At least 42 people were killed Saturday in a prison fire in a resort town and the director of another prison let 1,000 inmates flee after a deadly rebellion.Assailants fired on police guarding the Interior Ministry in a bold attack on the symbol of the Ben Ali reign and police returned fire, battening down the city center. An Associated Press Television News cameraman near the scene saw two bodies on the ground. Their identities were not known.Street violence took a new form Saturday with marauding gangs sacking homes in at least one wealthy neighborhood and residents, armed with golf clubs, forming self-styled vigilante committees to protect themselves.Rumors were rife in a chaotic Tunisia, with some citizens voicing suspicions the gangs were made up of Ben Ali loyalists bent on sewing chaos in the country.Many Tunisians also expressed worries about what lies ahead."This all happened in three days. Maybe tomorrow we can't eat," said Mohsen Yacoubi, referring to the mostly closed shops in the capital. He said Ben Ali's departure should have been negotiated over time. "Instead, it's war right away."Soldiers took up posts around Tunis, with tanks guarding strategic facilities like ministries and some major crossroads. The army presence was clear but discrete. Police were everywhere.Two quick changes in leadership since Ben Ali bowed out fed rumors that the army was the shadow ruler in a country without a government.Longtime Prime Minister Mohammed Ghannouchi, a Ben Ali ally, stepped stepped in briefly Friday to assume power after Ben Ali fled, leaving open the possibility that the longtime leader could return. But on Saturday, Constitutional Council President Fethi Abdennadher declared the president's departure permanent and gave lawmaker Mebazaa 60 days in which to organize new elections.Hours later, 77-year-old Mebazaa was sworn in and announced that all parties will be consulted "without exception or exclusion.""Ben Ali was a military dictator and everyone knows it," said Nouredine Jouini, 56, a former mechanical designer now guarding a closed up mall on Tunis' main avenue. But, he added, "The people aren't dumb. We know the prime minister was appointed by defense forces .... But it won't stay this way. Tunisia will function."Streets were flush with police, for decades the most visible - and most feared - force in Tunisia. Cars were checked, particularly rental cars considered suspect as gangs combed the city.In the idyllic coastal resort of Monastir, a prison fire killed 42 people, coroner Tarek Mghirbi told The Associated Press on Saturday. The cause of the fire was not immediately clear. In Mahdia, a resort town further down the coast, inmates were set free after a rebellion by prisoners who set fire to the facility holding some 1,000. Soldiers opened fire and five inmates were killed, a top local official said, asking not to be identified because of security concerns.A Paris-based photographer, Lucas Mebrouk Dolega of the EPA photo agency, was in critical condition Saturday after being hit in the face by a tear gas canister.An Associated Press photographer saw soldiers fire warning shots and try to stop looters from sacking the supermarket in Ariana, north of the capital, to no avail. Shops near the Tunis bazaar were also looted.Public television station TV7 - just renamed Tunisian National Television - broadcast phone calls from residents of working-class neighborhoods on the capital's outskirts, describing attacks against their homes by knife-wielding assailants. Young boys were seen armed with long sticks along some streets.The wealthy were not spared, with some homes sacked in the upper class La Marsa neighborhood.Tunisian television has urged citizens to organize patrols, and men and boys in the tony Tunis neighborhood of El Menzah set up makeshift barricades and armed themselves with golf clubs and baseball bats for patrols against intruders.Businesses owned by member's of Ben Ali's family also appeared to be targets. The family of the ex-president's wife, Leila Trabelsi, has financial interests in wide-ranging sectors from banking to car dealerships. A branch of the Zeitouna bank in Tunis founded by Ben Ali's son-in-law was torched, as were vehicles made by Kia, Fiat and Porsche - brands distributed in Tunisia by members of the ruling family."This isn't good at all. I'm very afraid for the kids and myself," said Lilia Ben Romdhan, a mother of three in central Tunis. "If (Ben Ali) had stayed in the country it would be better."Saudi King Abdullah's palace ended hours of speculation about where Ben Ali had fled to, confirming Saturday that the ousted president and some family members had landed in Saudi Arabia. The palace said the kingdom welcomed him with a wish for "peace and security to return to the people of Tunisia."A source inside the kingdom said he was in the small city of Abha, about 310 miles (500 kilometers) south of Jeddah - taken there to avoid sparking any possible demonstrations by Tunisians living in the larger, seaside city of Jeddah. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.The whereabouts of all family members were unclear.The French government said some members are in France - former colonial ruler - but are "not welcome." Spokesman Francois Baroin told France-Info radio that Ben Ali's family "have not shown a desire to stay on French soil and are going to leave."Thousands of tourists were being evacuated from the Mediterranean nation, where tourism is a chief industry.Ben Ali's downfall sent a warning to other autocratic leaders across the Arab world, especially because he did not seem vulnerable until very recently and managed his country of 10 million better than many other Middle Eastern nations.However, the new era he dubbed "The Change" - starting when he snatched power from the nation's founder, President Habib Bourguiba, in a bloodless palace coup in 1987 - never fully materialized.The improved quality of life for many failed to keep up with the increased limits on civil rights like freedom of expression and a growing reputation as a police state - invisible to the tourists flocking to the country's Mediterranean beaches.The unemployment rate stands officially at 14 percent but is thought to be far higher among the young - who make up 52 percent of Tunisia's 10 million inhabitants.The self-immolation, and eventual death, of a 26-year-old university graduate selling fruits in central Tunisia triggered a dizzying series of riots that moved to the capital and, relayed by social media like Facebook, spun into general anger over the regime.Nicolas Garriga, Oleg Cetinic in Tunis, Hassan Ammar in Doha, Qatar and Angela Doland and Jenny Barchfield in Paris contributed to this report.
– With Tunisians voting today in the Middle East's first elections since the dawn of the Arab Spring, analysts and citizens alike are looking to the vote for a sense of where Tunisia and democracy in the region might be heading, reports the AP. Tunisia's 7.5 million voters face an overwhelming list of up to 80 options, but most think the moderate Islamic party Ennahda—banned by the government more than a decade ago—will lead the voting. But the contentiousness of the vote is leading to charges all around that money is improperly influencing the elections, reports the New York Times. Ennahda allegedly is getting support from Persian Gulf governments, while some Islamists say liberal parties are receiving money from rich cronies of former dictator Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, and nearly everyone is fuming over Slim Riahi, an expatriate businessman who made a fortune in oil in Libya and now has founded a political party in Tunisia that seemingly has no stated ideology. “There was a political void that Ben Ali left, and we saw that many political parties were going to take advantage of this to manipulate the Tunisian people,” said one party leader.