A Tunisian court has sentenced a number of potential presidential election candidates to prison and banned them from running for office, according to local media, politicians, and a lawyer, in a move critics say is aimed at excluding serious competitors to President Kais Saied in October’s vote.

A court decision was issued on Monday against prominent politician Abdel Latif Mekki, activist Nizar Chaari, Judge Mourad Massoudi and another candidate, Adel Dou, according to lawyer Mokthar Jmai who spoke to Reuters. All four were sentenced to eight months in prison and banned from running for office on a charge of vote buying.

Another court late on Monday sentenced Abir Moussi – who is also a staunch critic of president Saied – to two years in prison, on a charge of insulting the election commission, local Mosaique radio reported.

Moussi, a key opposition figure, has been jailed since October, according to Agence France-Presse.

The ruling will reinforce the fears of opposition parties, candidates and human rights groups who have accused authorities of using arbitrary restrictions and intimidation in order to ensure the re-election of Saied in a vote set for 6 October.

Ahmed Nafatti, the manager of Mekki’s campaign, said they still planned to submit his candidacy papers on Tuesday.

“The decision is unfair and unjust, and aims to exclude a serious player from the race,” Nafatti said.

“It is a shocking rule, it aims to keep us away from running for the race after a series of restrictions,” Chaari told Reuters.

Head of the Free Destourian Party and a former parliament member, Moussi had submitted her candidacy on Saturday via her lawyers, two days before her reported sentence. Moussi was sentenced under Decree 54, a law enacted by Saied in 2022 to combat “false news”.

If the sentencing is upheld on appeal or later proceedings, Moussi will officially be barred from running for office as one of the candidacy criteria is that hopefuls must have a clean criminal record.

Last month, a court sentenced Lotfi Mraihi, a potential presidential election candidate and fierce critic of Saied, to eight months in prison on a charge of vote buying. It also banned him from running in presidential elections.

On Monday morning, Tunisian president, Kais Saied, submitted his official candidacy for the election October election.

Upon registering his candidacy, Saied, 66, told reporters in the capital Tunis that his candidacy was part of “a war of liberation and self-determination” aiming to “establish a new republic”.

Elected in 2019, Saied dissolved parliament in 2021 and began ruling by decree in a move the opposition described as a coup. He has said he will not hand over power to what he calls “non-patriots”.

Opposition parties, many of whose leaders are in prison, have accused Saied’s government of exerting pressure on the judiciary to crack down on his rivals in the 2024 elections and pave the way for him to win a second term.

Saied has denied placing any restrictions on rivals.

“There are no restrictions on potential candidates for the presidential elections … this is nonsense and lies,” Saied told reporters on Monday after submitting his official candidacy file.

“Whoever talks about restrictions is delusional,” he said. “I did not oppress anyone, and the law applies to everyone equally.”

Earlier on Monday, at least four other prominent potential candidates said the election commission had imposed a new restriction by demanding they submit their police record in order to register, but that the interior ministry had refused to provide those records.

They accused authorities of seeking to return Tunisia to the years of dictatorship and farce elections that were the norm before the Tunisian revolution in 2011.

The interior ministry was not immediately available for comment.

With Reuters and Agence France-Presse