(ANSAmed) - TUNIS, JANUARY 23 - Tunisia is looking at a new
government reshuffle after a failed attempt to broaden and thus
bolster the government majority by getting some of the ''minor''
parties involved(the last rejection was by the WAFA movement),
while a coalition pact agreement between the three largest
opposition parties will soon be made official.
Even though the date has not yet been set for its first
democratic ''general'' elections and the country is waiting for
the Constituent Assembly to finish its work, Tunisia is already
moving towards elections with a campaign that may prove to be
violent, and not only in dialectical terms. Too much tension has
been building up both inside and outside of the majority to hope
for an Anglo-Saxon style election campaign.
A great deal of shady areas are also clouding the government's
actions and those of other State powers, who do not seem to be
sufficiently determined to fight the violence breaking out with
alarming regularity - violence which does not seem justified
simply by the anger of the young and unemployed. Recent events
making headlines - the latest of which last night in Kairoun -
tell of extremely violent clashes between unemployed youths and
the police, with the former enjoying the support (it is not
clear to what extent asked for or approved of) of common
criminals, who take advantage of the situation to steal, loot
and destroy.
And this is not even mentioning the intolerance of
fundamentalists and the League for the Protection of the
Revolution, who seem to be defending interests that seem to have
little or nothing in common with the aims of the ''uprising''.
This week may also prove crucial for the government. Prime
Minister Hamadi Jebali is reportedly on the verge of announcing
the members of the next government, which has been spoken of for
quite some time and now seems to be the offing.
Jebali has understood that he should be careful about pushing
too hard, and that the infighting regularly sparked between
Ennahdha and the other parties of the troika (Ettakatol and CPR)
are wearing the majority down and not simply creating a bit of
friction between the allies involved. He has put forward his
proposal, asking his allies to fill the ministry positions that
are their due. But things seem to be swerving off-course, given
that especially Ettakatol is showing impatience with the
direction chosen by Ennahdha - which has no intention of giving
up key ministries and which is pushing for the creation of a
position (general coordinator of the government) who would have
an enormous amount of power.
Given the problems within the majority, the opposition seems to
have set aside the points it does not agree with, and the three
largest parties - Al Jomhouri (the Republican Party), Al Massar
and Nidaa Tounes - have formed a coalition. The coalition's
contents and plans have not yet been officially announced and
are eagerly awaited, and it will likely prove interesting to see
how the different ideological backgrounds of the parties will be
harmonized into a shared programme. (ANSAmed).
