This is a first in the Arab world. Mounir Baatour, openly homosexual and president of the Shams association which militates for the decriminalization of the homosexuality in Tunisia, is candidate for the Tunisian presidential election of November 10, 2019.

"After so many years of struggle for minority rights, I realized that nobody can do the job better than me," he told the Belga news agency.

This 48-year-old lawyer, who is also the president of the Tunisian Liberal Party, is campaigning on issues that are dear to him, such as "real equality between women and men", but also the "defense of minorities" and the "recognition of the rights of Amazigh people. and LGBTI + people.

"Our program aims to democratize power by strengthening Parliament's weight and giving more weight to local institutions." On the economic front, our program targets growth in production and the real sector, job creation and clean-up. an economy artificially inflated and extremely dependent on foreign investment, "he also announced on his Facebook page.

"Free Tunisia from old parties"

Article 230 of the Tunisian Penal Code condemns homosexuality to "three years of imprisonment". Mounir Baatour himself was imprisoned for three months in 2013 and the activities of the Shams association of which he is the president and co-founder have been suspended several times.

"My goal is to liberate Tunisia from the old parties and traditional governance that have brought Tunisia its troubles," said the progressive candidate to the site Raseef 22. In the viewfinder of the candidate: the Islamist party Ennhada. According to him, before "the arrival of Islamists in power - the troika in 2011, the alliance between Nidaa Tounes and Ennahdha in 2014", persecution of homosexuals in Tunisia were less common than today.

Recognized abroad for his fight to defend the rights of homosexuals (he received in particular the 2018 Idaho Award in France), Mounir Baatour has already been able to gather more than the required 10,000 signatures.

His candidacy also provoked negative reactions. Sometimes insulted and accused of "shaming" Tunisia on social networks, Mounir Baatour is threatened in his professional activity. Some Tunisian lawyers have called for his removal from the bar on the grounds that it "would seriously undermine the image of the bar," says on Twitter the National Council of the Bar.

On the proposal of @RichardSEDILLOT the # AGCNB vote a motion of support to the Tunisian lawyer @mounirbaatour whose cancellation is claimed by some colleagues on the grounds that his homosexuality would seriously undermine the image of the bar. cc @ProtectLawyers pic.twitter.com/wTMlegNOCO

CNB (@CNBarreaux) July 6, 2019

Mounir Baatour also denotes in the Tunisian political landscape by his position on Israel. "Two years ago, he expressed his full support for the establishment of normalized relations with Israel and said he would be happy to visit Israel if he had the opportunity," the Israeli daily Haaretz recalls.

Since then, the president of Shams would have changed position, conditioning the normalization of relations between Tunisia and Israel to the recognition of the rights of the Palestinians and the establishment of a peace agreement in which Tunis would mediate.