Tunisians have backed a presidential system for the country in an online poll that was organised by President Kais Saied but drew scant public interest.

Saied seized power last July in what critics branded a coup, abruptly suspending the mixed presidential-parliamentary system enshrined in the North African country’s constitution.

Technology Minister Nizar Ben Neji announced on Thursday evening that 534,915 people took part in the questionnaire — representing little more than 7.5 percent of the country’s 7.07 million electorate.

Of them, 86.4 percent backed a presidential system, as sought by Saied, and 70.7 percent wanted to select individual candidates for parliament rather than the current party list system.

The country’s 2014 constitution was a hard-won compromise between rival ideological camps reached three years after a revolt toppled dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Tunisia has often been praised abroad as the only democracy to emerge from the Arab Spring uprisings.

But many Tunisians have long become disillusioned with a political class seen as corrupt and incompetent.