Events over the past week suggest Tunisia may be on course to get itself a real revolution: a real significant break from the recent past, not just a recycling of an old elite. But which revolution will this be? A liberal revolution, grounded in a rewritten Constitution, or something more radical? Could Tunisian public opinion be demanding one thing but be acting in a way that jeopardises its acquisition?
Listening to the highly vocal discussion in Tunisia – as I have, transfixed, over the past week – one is left in no doubt the majority want wide-ranging liberal reforms (in the broad sense of that term). All the arguments are about freedoms for the political process and its guarantees, rather than about any particular vision.
As I write (Wednesday morning, before the Prime Minister’s expected major announcement concerning new arrangements for the government), crowds are still in the street demanding all the former members of the old regime’s ruling party (the RCD) should be rooted out of the government. That would include all the ministers holding senior portfolios – foreign affairs, finance, interior and defence – and Prime Minister Mohammed Ghannouchi himself.
The middle classes appear to have left the streets but news organisations like Al Jazeera report the demand for all RCD members to resign is widely shared. No matter the personal honesty of these ministers, their hands are dirty given their involvement in the former government.
But understandable though this sentiment is, and arrogant as it may sound for someone who has not lived under President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to appear to be lecturing people who have risked their lives for liberty, the question needs to be raised: Would eliminating men like Mr Ghannouchi from the government now speed along the liberal revolution or could it endanger it?
Mr Ghannouchi has been quick to send small but significant signals of winds of change.
From his first full day in office, the national TV station has been known as National Tunisian TV; the former name, Tunis 7 was dropped. (The name was a hated symbol of the Ben Ali regime: the number seven was a favourite of the President – he came to power on November 7, 1987 – just as purple, his favourite colour, bespattered the country.)
The line-up of young presenters – quick replacements of a vanished former media frontline – have been busy in phone-in programmes, with an unending stream of callers chipping in, proudly giving their names.
The appointment of an opposition leader, Najib Chebbi, as Minister of Regional Development had a special meaning. The uneven development of Tunisia, with the bulk of the Budget going to the tourist areas, is a problem going back to the Bourguiba era and exacerbated under President Ben Ali. Regional development has much to do with justice.
Similarly, the appointment of Moufida Tlatli as Minister of Culture was more than just a perfunctory appointment of a film director with internationally distinguished films under her belt. Ms Tltatli’s films have addressed (and linked) issues of political freedoms and women’s rights.
But none of these signals have been enough. Mr Ghannouchi has resigned from the RCD but (at the time of writing) people still want his resignation, saying any government with former RCD members in it is a masquerade. Four members of his government resigned within a few days in response to popular sentiment.
The demand for a completely fresh start is a natural one. But there are considerations that should be giving pause.
Two things will be necessary to underwrite a liberal revolution. One is constitutional reform, which will guarantee basic freedoms – of expression, association, etc. – and political accountability. Such rewriting should also permit the interim government to hold the general election later than the currently stipulated 60 days; otherwise the opposition groups may not have enough time to organise themselves properly.
It would appear, both from official and informal reports, that the Ghannouchi government is ready to embark on such a constitutional programme. Whether it will do so in really effective ways cannot be guaranteed, of course. The crowds in the streets help to keep up the pressure.
But the liberal freedoms are also underwritten by economic stability. High unemployment (especially among graduates) was a factor contributing to Mr Ben Ali’s downfall.
But the last month of protests have cost the country, according to an official calculation, $2.2 billion in lost production, exports and tourist arrivals. Some 5,000 tourists stopped their holiday short last week. The country needs to reacquire a reputation for stability or else the steady stream of foreign investment (some 30-40 per cent of total industrial investment in 2009) will dry up and not come back for years.
Stability will not be signalled simply by the crowds stopping their protests. The international markets and investors need reassurance that Tunisian policies are directed by experienced hands. Yesterday, Moody’s downgraded Tunisia’s credit rating. Mr Ben Ali’s Tunisia shut out of any decision-making, technocratic or otherwise, anyone who would not join the RCD, which, for this reason, had about 10 per cent of the population among its members. Mr Ghannouchi, like his finance and foreign ministers, was among the technocrats.
A Tunisian government without any remnant of senior RCD figures would be a government with no dirty hands – but also no senior government experience. Would technocratic advice be enough to underwrite economic stabilisation? Or would we see a rerun of events seen in other countries, where textbook economics proves insensitive to practical conditions and ends up exacerbating conditions it was meant to relieve?
A lot turns on the answers to those questions. Prolonged economic instability in Tunisia might pave the way for the return of a strongman, whether in secular or Islamist guise.
ranierfsadni@europe.com