Tunisia: President impeached Prime Minister and suspended Parliament | Maximum tension in the streets

the President of Tunisia, Kais Saied, suspended the activity of Parliament for 30 days and dismissed the Prime Minister, Hichem Mechichi, plunging the country into a political crisis.

The president made the announcement on Sunday evening, following an emergency meeting with security forces officials at the presidential palace in Cartago. The decision angered part of the population, who took to the streets to protest despite the curfew.

This Sunday, after a day of demonstrations in many cities of the country in refusal of the management of the social crisis and the management of the pandemic by the authorities, Saied announced the suspension of parliamentary activity for 30 days and indicated than he will take over the executive “with the help of the government”.

In this context, he clarified that the head of government, Hichem Mechichi, was dismissed from his post; the Minister of Defense, Ibrahim Bartaji; and government spokesperson, Minister of Public Administration and Acting Minister of Justice Hasna Ben Slimane.

According to President Saied, he made this decision to “save Tunisia, the Tunisian state and people. “This justification has not convinced some of the citizens, tired of the balance of power that hinder the management of the social and health crisis, which after the presidential speech, they took to the streets despite the curfew in force, launching fireworks and honking in the capital and other cities.

Parliament closed

This Monday, in front of the Parliament, located in the city of Tunis, Several hundred supporters of President Saied prevented supporters of the main Islamist-oriented parliamentary party, Ennahdha, from approaching their boss, Rached Ghannouchi, who is also the Speaker of Parliament. In this context, the police closed, without a warrant, the offices of the Qatari channel Al Jazeera.

The Ennahdha party sharply criticized Saied’s measures, which he denounced as “a blow against the revolution”, de acueredo with a statement posted on Facebook.

Ghannouchi, who had been parked in a vehicle in front of the closed door of Parliament for hours, was unable to enter the building because the soldiers deployed to guard the hemicycle prevented him from doing so. The leader was accompanied by several deputies from Ennahdha and the Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, Samira Chaouachi, from the allied Qalb Tounes party.

“We want to enter Parliament! […] We are the protectors of the Constitution “Chaouachi told soldiers deployed behind the closed door of Parliament, according to a video posted by local media and posted on social media.

“We are the protectors of the nation,” replied one of the soldiers, adding that he was simply following “orders”. “The Tunisian people will never accept authoritarian power, whatever you try, so do not continue this game,” responded Ghannouchi.

Ghannouchi and President Saied have been in a political battle for six months, which has paralyzed the government and disrupted the public authorities, amid the wave of coronavirus infections that has rocked the country since early July. With nearly 18,000 deaths from covid-19, Tunisia, with 12 million inhabitants, has one of the worst death rates in the world.

Repercussions

The formations that make up the Ennahdha coalition, Qalb Tounes and the Islamist nationalist movement Karama, also they condemned Saied’s decisions. In opposition, the Corriente Democrática, a social democratic party which has supported Saied on several occasions, joined in the rejection of the presidential measure, although it blamed it on “popular tension and the social crisis, economic and health, and the lack of future horizons. the ruling coalition led by Ennahdha. “

For its part, General Union of Tunisian Workers (UGTT), an influential trade union center, implicitly supported government decisions indicating that they were “in conformity” with the Constitution, even though he called for the continuation of the democratic process which has already been going on for more than a decade since the uprising which ended the dictatorship of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali .

Abroad, Turkey, aliada of Ennahdha, called for the restoration of “democratic legitimacy”. Germany, as, claimed the “return to constitutional order as quickly as possible” and demanded “respect for civil liberties, which is one of the most important achievements of the Tunisian revolution” of 2011, often presented as the only successful one of the Arab Spring.