Political Analysis : Game over in Arab spring Tunisia

In Part 6 of RO’s Arab spring — 4 years series, we analyse where Tunisia, the birth­place of the Arab spring stands.

By Adnan Khan

It was back in Decem­ber 2010, 4 years ago, that the self-immolation of Muham­mad Bouaz­izi cre­ated a sweep­ing wave across the region. No-one could have fore­seen the impact this one act would have on the Mus­lim world, but it encap­su­lated the sit­u­a­tion in the Mus­lim lands. The lack of eco­nomic oppor­tu­ni­ties, poverty, oppres­sion, red tape, cor­rup­tion and the lack of any mean­ing­ful long term prospects, drove Bouaz­izi to the edge. Within months Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Syria and Bahrain were wit­ness­ing his­tory being made. For the peo­ple of Tunisia there was much hope that the region was on the cusp of real change. But four years on, the birth­place of the Arab spring has all evap­o­rated as Ben Ali’s cronies are back in power.

When Ben Ali was over­thrown in Jan­u­ary 2011 an interim gov­ern­ment replaced him and elec­tions took place later in the year in Octo­ber 2011. The country’s Islamic group Ennahda won the leg­isla­tive polls, secur­ing 89 out of 217 seats and pro­ceeded to form a coali­tion gov­ern­ment with the sec­u­lar par­ties that won the sec­ond and third-highest num­ber of par­lia­men­tary seats. The rivalry between all these groups cre­ated polit­i­cal cri­sis at every junc­ture as they all jock­eyed for power. For many, hav­ing elec­tions was con­sid­ered progress from an era when Ben Ali monop­o­lised the coun­tries rule. But the elec­tions that took place were flawed from the out­set. The elec­tions were for par­lia­ments which were a relic of every­thing that was wrong in Tunisia. Rather than change and replace such a sys­tem, Ennahda entered the cor­rupt sys­tem and main­tained the exist­ing sec­u­lar system.

As lead­ers of the con­stituent assem­bly, Ennahda was charged with the writ­ing of a new con­sti­tu­tion for the coun­try. Despite run­ning on an Islamic ticket, Ennahda imme­di­ately aban­doned Islamic rule and began labelling it imprac­ti­cal. Ennahda declared it would not sup­port mak­ing the shari’ah the main source of leg­is­la­tion in the new con­sti­tu­tion, main­tain­ing the sec­u­lar nature of the state.[1] Ennahda’s leader, Rachid Ghan­nouchi, explained with regards to estab­lish­ing the Caliphate after its elec­toral vic­tory: “Def­i­nitely, we are a nation state. We desire a state for Tunisian reforms, for the Tunisian State. As for the issue of the Khi­lafah, this is an issue that is not one of real­ity. The issue of today’s real­ity is that we are a Tunisian State that desires reform, so that it becomes a State for the Tunisian Peo­ple, not against them.”[2] Ennahda insisted that it will keep the first arti­cle of the 1956 con­sti­tu­tion. The arti­cle enshrined the sep­a­ra­tion of reli­gion and state, stat­ing that: “Tunisia is a free, inde­pen­dent and sov­er­eign state, its reli­gion is Islam, its lan­guage is Ara­bic and it is a repub­lic.” Ghan­nouchi told jour­nal­ists that the arti­cle: “is the object of con­sen­sus among all sec­tors of soci­ety; pre­serv­ing Tunisia’s Arab-Muslim iden­tity while also guar­an­tee­ing the prin­ci­ples of a demo­c­ra­tic and sec­u­lar state.“[3]

Despite aban­don­ing Islamic rule, dif­fer­ences emerged with the other par­ties on a myr­iad of issues. The peo­ple of Tunisia grew frus­trated with the delays in the for­ma­tion of the new con­sti­tu­tion, along­side the eco­nomic strug­gles that had per­sisted since Ben Ali’s pres­i­dency.  Mat­ters reached boil­ing point in Feb­ru­ary 2013 when Chokri Belaid, a promi­nent sec­u­lar oppo­si­tion leader was assas­si­nated. This trig­gered mass protests and riots across Tunisia. With the gov­ern­ment already strug­gling to rule, the killing of oppo­si­tion law­maker Mohammed Brahmi in July 2013 led to polit­i­cal grid­lock. The ongo­ing demon­stra­tions and pub­lic crit­i­cism by the sec­u­lar oppo­si­tion forced Ennahda to step down in Octo­ber 2013 and allow a tech­no­cratic gov­ern­ment to draft the new con­sti­tu­tion. By Jan­u­ary 2014, the new gov­ern­ment had cre­ated and passed the long-awaited con­sti­tu­tion, which effec­tively main­tained the pre-Arab spring system

The elec­tions of Octo­ber 26 2014 saw the rever­sal of Ennahda’s for­tunes and the return of the sec­u­lar groups, includ­ing many cronies from the Ben Ali era. Many in Tunisia united on the post-Ben Ali era, Ali Tra­belsi, 38 told Al Jazeera: “I am not going to waste an hour or so queue­ing for noth­ing. Last time I voted [for Ennahda] and I haven’t seen any tan­gi­ble changes. I even think it is going to be worse next time. I’d bet­ter earn a few dinars instead of going to vote.”[4] As the months turned into years Ennahda were unable to deal with any of the press­ing issues affect­ing the lives of the peo­ple. Bro­ken promises, paired with a strug­gling econ­omy and vio­lence for long fuelled cyn­i­cism of Ennahda. Every­day issues such as poor rub­bish col­lec­tion and wide­spread job­less­ness prompted many to say things were bet­ter under Ben Ali. Despite receiv­ing the sup­port of the masses only a few years ago, Nidaa Tounes founder, Beji Caid Essebsi, an 87-year-old vet­eran of both the Bour­guiba and Ben Ali regimes, returned to power. Ben Ali’s cronies were back in power.

The peo­ple of Tunisia took to the streets in one of the most repressed coun­tries in the Mid­dle East to put into the dust­bin of his­tory its bru­tal ruler who for long oppressed them. Many put their faith into Ennahda and its Islamic call, as it res­onated with their beliefs. Very quickly though Ennahda faced with basic chal­lenges in gov­er­nance, began to aban­don Islam, assum­ing this would pre­serve their rule. Whilst Ennahda went to great lengths to demon­strate its Islamic cre­den­tials to the masses, it went to even greater lengths to demon­strate its mod­er­a­tion to the West. Ennahda’s polit­i­cal cal­cu­la­tions were all rooted in per­sonal par­ti­san gains. They believed that the Islamic sys­tem could only be imple­mented grad­u­ally. Once in power Ennahda lacked much in pol­icy and they went on to argue that Islamic solu­tions aren’t ready to deal with prob­lems such as poverty, unem­ploy­ment and devel­op­ment. They believed imple­ment­ing Islam would scare minori­ties, scare investors and scare the inter­na­tional com­mu­nity. Ennahda’s offi­cials went to great lengths to explain how Islam must be applied grad­u­ally and how it was imprac­ti­cal in Tunisia. Ennahda aban­doned Islam and failed utterly even when it attempted to rule with sec­u­lar­ism. Ennahda effec­tively used the peo­ples Islamic sen­ti­ments to come to power, and once in power it pre­sented the imprac­ti­cal­ity of Islam as a jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for its own incompetency.

Part 1 — Arab Spring – From Eupho­ria to Disaster

Part 2 — Egypt’s mil­i­tary holds the Arab spring in Check

Part 3 — Yemen — From Eupho­ria to Disintegration

Part 4 — Thwart­ing the Syr­ian Revolution

Part 5 — Libya, the Arab spring and Chaos

[1] http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/03/27/203529.html

[2] http://alhittin.com/2011/11/13/rashid-al-ghannushi-rejects-the-idea-of-khilafah-wants-reforms/

[3] http://www.france24.com/en/20120328-tunisia-islamists-rule-out-sharia-constitution-ennahda

[4] http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2014/10/tunisia-decides-20141021164020540690.html