Badr Eddine Ouhaibi - Tunisia
As soon as the IHEC announced the final list of 26 candidates in Tunisia's presidential race and campaigning, the election promises were followed up in a fast and controversial format.
While these promises intersect on national sovereignty, economic and development promotion, the fight against terrorism and foreign policy, they also intersect on many points and positions that have aroused controversy among political observers in Tunisia, and many interactions on the websites.
Naji Djelloul, an independent and former leader who recently withdrew from the Nidaa Tounes movement, said he ran for president to implement the 2014 election promises that the appeal failed to deliver, and declared his moral commitment to complete the promises of late Tunisian President Béji Kaid Essebsi as the focal point of his electoral platform.
Abdelkrim Zubeidi, who enjoys the support of Tunisia's call for the presidential race, and on several occasions stated that he was impressed by the personality of the late president, chose in his election campaign to go to a market in the province of Beja to admit to the high cost of living.
This scene reminded Tunisians that Caid Essebsi was so sobbing in a capital market that he felt the high cost of living during his 2014 campaign.
Penal laws
Elias al-Fafkhash and Mohsen Marzouk agreed on the need to abolish prison sentences for consumers of local cannabis, and to tighten the sentence on Mroujeh due to the harsh social and legal consequences for young people.
Marzouk went beyond sharing his opinion on consumption punishment, and went on to express his conviction that state-sponsored cultivation of Indian cannabis for medical purposes and export abroad should be introduced as an economic solution that would develop some areas and provide jobs for young people.
In the same vein, Naji Jalloul sparked a wave of criticism after his statement that he is against punishing those convicted of rape, but considered that the best solution is castration, because of the devastating psychological and social effects on his victims difficult to overcome.
The army in mind
For his part, Obeid Braiki, the candidate of the "Tunisia Forward" movement, pledged to appoint a military figure at the head of the Ministry of National Defense, as an exceptional measure to distance the military establishment from all political rivalries and to consolidate its neutral position it remained during and after the revolution.
Al-Safi Said, an independent candidate backed by leftist nationalist parties, said that he would strengthen the role of the army and make it a strong and sophisticated institution that preserves democratic principles and plays a developmental role, given the role it played in building the state and maintaining its sovereignty and entity.
Naji Djelloul also considered that the military is capable of supporting the educational policy of the country, because it possesses scientific and human resources that can play a role in the vocational training of Tunisian youth, which is relatively transformed into an economic institution, as was the case in the 1970s.
For his part, Mohsen Marzouk said that the army is capable of playing an economic role and that the revenues will return to it, as is the case in several other countries. Some members of the army must be unloaded for combat operations and others for economic work, in order to generate revenues that enable them to finance the combat side.
Promises firmness
In a televised interview, Saif Eddine Makhlouf, the candidate of the Dignity Coalition, considered that the UGTT is a thorn in the side of the Tunisian revolution, calling for accountability for its deliberate damage to the Tunisian economy through strikes and the prosecution of its leaders on charges of bribery and corruption.
For Youssef Chahed (temporarily resigned), the reform of the political system does not necessarily pass through the revision of the constitution, but requires the change of the rules of procedure of the parliament to facilitate the work of the prime minister, in addition to lifting the immunity of deputies and facilitating its mechanisms in view of the impediment to the functioning of the state judicial facility .
Constitutional law professor and independent candidate Qais Sa'eed expressed his support for this political project from another angle, saying that the agency of deputies granted to them by the people must be withdrawn, and that the absence of constitutional mechanisms to allow citizens to assess the work of deputies and the possibility of ending the parliamentary period in cases of proven failure Progress of the country.
Menji Rahoui and Hamma Hammami, whose candidacy led to splits within the Popular Front (leftist coalition), demanded that France apologize to the Tunisian people for the colonial era and the need to compensate for the damage inflicted on them since that period of Tunisia's history. It is the same position taken by Seif Eddine Makhlouf from France, demanding it to recover the wealth it looted from Tunisia.