By Daily Star Editorial

As the vote counting continues in Sunday’s election in Tunisia, the results will be important. But more important is the manner in which the Tunisian political parties and movements deal with these results.

Most observers are predicting that the Islamist party Ennahda will come out on top. This won’t lead right away to an Islamist-led government, since the election is going to produce a council that draws up the blueprint for the coming phase, by setting down a constitution and presumably other laws. These will help Tunisia hold a free and fair election to produce its first post-Ben Ali government at a later stage.

Meanwhile, the central question comes down to how Ennahda and other political groups that call themselves “Islamic” in some way, overtly or covertly, will deal with the responsibility of winning an election.

People inside and outside Tunisia will scrutinize closely the line that Ennahda chooses to follow. They will be focused on whether the group, and others like it, is truly committed to political pluralism, and the chance of seeing a non-Islamist party win an election further down the road.

Many people fear the prospect of seeing an Islamist party hold official political power, and Tunisia will form an important test case for this development. The elections represent an opportunity for Ennahda and others to prove these fears wrong. This will take place through a commitment to democracy and development, and, in short, the needs of the people.

People in this world have tried experiments with Islamic government, in differing degrees. The point is to avoid declaring that a certain type of Islamist politics, or non-Islamist politics, represents the “final answer.” On a given day, a certain group might represent the majority, but majorities can change. All sides must commit to the principle of rotation of power, and give guarantees that they do not intend to introduce changes that would install ideological regimes.

The last few decades have seen more than enough experiments in ideological politics; Arab political systems are in need of a big dose of problem-solving, and not parties-for-life. The era of the Cold War and dictatorial “strongmen” running countries in the region is over. Today, people in this part of the world require answers to a different set of problems than the post-colonial period. Countries in the region must define the roles they should play in the emerging global economy; they require national systems of politics that allow the best possible people to be elected, to make the best possible decisions, and be replaced, peacefully, if these policies turn out to be less than satisfactory.

In short, the winners of elections must spend their time governing, and getting ready to hand off the baton to someone else if they fail the ultimate test.