DHAKA: Tunisia’s parliament has approved a unity government led by the secular Nidaa Tounes party and including its Islamist rivals, in the latest step in its transition to full democracy following a 2011 uprising.

The cabinet headed by Prime Minister Habib Essid, which includes members of his secularist Nidaa Tounes party and Ennahda, was approved on Thursday by 166 members of the 217-seat parliament, reports the Aljazeera.

Thirty members opposed while eight abstained, as Essid, whose cabinet includes ministers from four parties, promised ‘work and nothing but work’ on the country’s economic and security problems.

Parliament speaker Mohamed Ennaceur welcomed what he called ‘a comfortable majority’ in the vote of confidence.

Essid’s earlier attempt to form a government consisting of just his Nidaa Tounes party and one other party was scrapped after it became clear it would lose the vote of confidence.

It is the first government to be formed after the North African country’s first free presidential and parliamentary elections last year.

BDST: 0957 HRS, FEB 06, 2015