On September 15, Tunisia will go to the polls to elect a president in its second freely contested election since the 2011 Revolution. In this fledgling but promising democracy, the country will be deciding on the political direction it will take for the next five years.

The election, brought forward from November after the death of the incumbent president Beji Caid Essebsi, is proving to be an ideological battleground between a wide range of competing social and political ideals.

The Tunisian people will be making their choice from a crowded field of 26 candidates. If none secures 50 percent of the vote, a second round between the top two candidates will then take place. The contenders represent a breadth of choice which would be striking in any democracy. For a country which was subject to one-party rule in the years between decolonisation in 1956 and the Revolution in 2011, the range of candidates is breathtaking.

Polls have identified the front-runners as Nabil Karoui, the controversial media icon; Kaïs Saïed, the conservative law professor; Abir Moussi, a woman who worked in the pre-revolutionary regime; Youssef Chahed, the current head of government, who presents himself as the candidate to continue the liberal reforms of the early post-colonial regime; and Abdelfattah Mourou, the candidate for Ennahda, the prominent Islamist party.

The Independent High Commission for Elections, the body which governs the running of elections, has also courted controversy. Although it did not rule out any of the front-runners, it did block the candidacy of Mounir Baatour, who had attracted attention – particularly in foreign media – as the first openly gay presidential candidate in Tunisia. Baatour met all the criteria to stand and the reasons for his rejection remain unclear. Read more via The New Arab