Tunisia: The president is preparing to assign a replacement to the traps, and Reuters reports the scenes of resignation

Tunisian President Qais Said announced the acceptance of the resignation of Prime Minister Elias Al-Fakhfakh and the start of consultations to assign a new figure to form a government.

According to a statement issued by the Tunisian Presidency today, Thursday, Saeed sent a message to the Speaker of the Parliament, Rashid Ghannouchi, informing him that he had received and accepted the resignation of the traps in accordance with the requirements of Chapter 98 of the Constitution.

Chapter 98 of its first clause states that "the resignation of the head of government is the resignation of the entire government, and the resignation is submitted in writing to the President of the Republic who informs the Speaker of the Parliament."

The presidency said that Saeed also sent a second message to Ghannouchi, to request a list of parties, coalitions and parliamentary blocs, to hold consultations with them, as stipulated in Chapter 89 of the constitution, with the aim of assigning the most capable figure to form a government.

The traps submitted his resignation to the President yesterday, Wednesday, to break out new complications in the Tunisian political scene after increasing pressure on him because of his accountability in the suspicion of conflicts of interests.

Happy struggle and renaissance

The resignation of the traps came at a time when the Ennahda Movement - the largest party in parliament - was seeking to collect signatures to vote by withdrawing confidence from the government. Had this process been written, it would have given the Ennahda party, in place of President Said, the right to nominate a new prime minister.

However, political sources told Reuters that Saeed asked Al-Fakhakh to submit his resignation as pressure increased in parliament.

Reuters quoted law professor Mona Karim as saying that President Saeed now has 10 days to name a new candidate for prime minister, who must form a government within a month.

The last parliamentary elections in October last year produced a parliament in which no party held more than a quarter of the seats, complicating efforts to form a stable government.

President Said and Ennahda have been fighting for influence, since the movement failed in its own bid to form a governing coalition late last year.

Despite this, Ennahdha joined the government of the traps at the time, but it launched its move to withdraw confidence from it after suspicions of conflicts of interest appeared before the National Anti-Corruption Commission. The suspicions relate to his possession of shares in companies that have concluded contracts with the state, but he denies any wrongdoing.

Dismissal of Renaissance ministers

With his resignation, the traps at the same time sacked the six ministers of Ennahda in the government, which the movement described as "a tampering with the institutions and a convulsive reaction."

In a statement, Al-Nahdha Movement pointed to the need for the caretaker government not to dismiss officials or appoint others for what it called settling accounts, calling on President Saeed to assume his responsibility in ensuring the administration’s stability and neutralizing it from political recruitment.

A note to disqualify Ghannouchi

Meanwhile, 4 blocs in the Tunisian parliament have formally submitted a list of no confidence from the Speaker of the People's Assembly, Rashid Ghannouchi, who heads the Ennahda movement.

The list was deposited with the seizure office in Parliament after it fulfilled the quorum (73 votes) by the Democratic Bloc, the Long Live Tunisia and the Reform Bloc, and a number of deputies of the Future and National Blocs and some independent representatives.

For his part, the head of the political bureau of the Al-Nahda movement, Nur al-Din al-Arabawi, a member of parliament, described the presentation of the no-confidence list as a "review process that will not pass."

Al-Arabawi said, in a statement to Anadolu Agency, that "submitting a list to withdraw confidence from Parliament Speaker Rashid Ghannouchi is expected and acceptable from a constitutional and political point of view, and they have the right to do so."

However, the challenge before them (the presenters of the list) is to obtain 109 votes to approve the list in the plenary session.

Therefore, Al-Arabawi considered that submitting the list is a show process, which has no horizon in practice, and he ruled out obtaining the required votes.

The blocs advanced in the regulations to withdraw confidence from Ghannouchi explain their step as "as a result of the Speaker taking decisions individually without consulting the Parliament Office, and issuing statements regarding Tunisia's foreign relations that contradict the orientation of Tunisian diplomacy."