Tunisia held a presidential election on September 15, 2019. Just prior to that election, presidential debates were held over three days, with all 26 candidates on the ballot invited into at least one debate. At the election, no one polled as much as 50%, so a runoff was held October 13. At the runoff, one of the independent candidates, Kais Saief, was elected. See the wikipedia article about the election.
Sadly, the election rules in Tunisia were revised to keep out some candidates. Including the first openly gay candidate. But, despite the faults, the number of candidates on the ballot did not appear to confuse voters.