The Republic of Tunisia had never held a general election before, and President Habib Bourguiba felt obliged to campaign, even though there was no need. Bourguiba himself was sole candidate for President, and the only organized opposition to his Neo-Destour (New Constitution) Party were two lone Communist candidates for the National Assembly who both went down to humiliating defeat. But last week, when Bourguiba won 1,005,769 out of 1,007,959 votes, more than 99%, it was far more than the empty gesture of the usual one-party state.
In his 2½ years as President, Bourguiba has managed to break almost every rule in the Arab nationalist handbook, but has never lost his original popularity as the country's "Supreme Fighter." Though hardly the dedicated democrat ("If they accuse me of dictatorship, I accept—I am creating a nation!"), he has made his pitch not to the mob but to Tunisia's strong and influential middle class. Denounced by Nasser's Radio Cairo as "an imperialist lackey," Bourguiba has kept his country firmly within the Western camp, and one of his proudest boasts is that when the French bombed the Tunisian village of Sakiet and left 79 villagers dead, not a single Frenchman in Tunisia (and there are 80,000) was attacked in retaliation. Bourguiba received $22 million in U.S. aid last year, but has scrupulously refrained from trying to play Washington off against Moscow. "Never," former U.S. Ambassador Lewis Jones once remarked, "has so much friendship been acquired for so little."
Last week some of Bourguiba's friends were riled that President Eisenhower was passing by loyal Tunisia, while paying a call on Morocco's King Mohammed V, who, bowing to internal pressures, has just told the U.S. it must move out of its $500 million airbases in Morocco. But it turned out that Washington was only waiting for a sign from Tunisia, and when it came, the White House invited Bourguiba to visit Ike for lunch aboard the U.S.S. Des Moines as it sails through the Mediterranean. Everyone was happy again and Bourguiba's only misgiving was whether the weather would be good that day, since being a good sailor is not one of his accomplishments.