Tunisia - The

head of the Ennahda movement and the Tunisian parliament, whose work has been frozen, Rashid Ghannouchi, reveals in a lengthy dialogue with Al Jazeera Net his position on the continuation of the exceptional measures that the country is going through, and the possibility of the president heading to dissolve the Ennahda movement and track its leaders, as well as answering the accusations that the movement is involved in political assassinations.

Here is the full conversation:

  • 7 months have passed since President Kais Saied's actions. How do you evaluate the political situation in Tunisia?

President Kais Saied has turned into a single expression of the meanings of the failure that the Tunisian experience suffers from. The word that sums up any judgment that we can call his actions is failure and abject failure. He failed to fulfill his oath on the constitution, failed to fulfill his pledges to respect what remained of its chapters, and failed to fulfill his oath on the constitution. Stopping the economic and social crisis afflicting the Tunisian people, and he failed to respond to the expectations of the disadvantaged youth groups for which he presented himself as a spokesperson. Rather, he repealed the law that Parliament voted on to enable those who have been unemployed to have the right to work.

He failed for the third time to form a government capable of dealing with public affairs in the country, and failed to present a budget that guarantees a minimum level of economic and financial security for Tunisians, and failed to remove them from the scenes of conflict between the country’s political elites and transfer the fight that was simulated to distort Parliament, so that he From the palace of Carthage every time the Tunisians have a frightening speech that disturbs them and does not give them any hope in their reality or in their future.

On the external level, he failed to present a bright image of Tunisia abroad, which made it suffer from an unprecedented international isolation in its history and made it approach at a frightening speed to describe a failed state, as the state is unable to perform its minimum duties, such as paying wages on time and providing The basic materials that every Tunisian family needs daily.

  • You accuse the President of failure, and there are those who accuse you of being responsible for 10 years of political, economic and social failure and describe your reign as the black decade?

We refused to describe the period before the revolution as absolute evil, and our honorable Messenger did not say I came to erase everything, but he said, peace be upon him, I came to perfect morals, we do not want to be like the one against whom the verse “whenever a nation enters, its sister is cursed”, but we want to follow Like our Holy Prophet, any description of a period of absolute evil is subjective, dishonest, and has extreme exclusionary goals.

It is important to emphasize that the political achievement at that stage was a great achievement of a constitution and the establishment of a state of law and institutions, but unfortunately this building was not completed and now there are those who want to overthrow it. Exploiting this deficiency is not to fix it, but to demolish all the construction.

We are now threatened with losing the home, which is our state, the unity of our people, and the stability of our homeland, which we need for a decent life. There is a delay in the payment of salaries, and it is possible that we will soon reach the inability to pay salaries.

  • What is your message to all of these, including the President of the Republic?

We call on the president and all the forces of our people to remedy the situation before falling into the abyss. We tell everyone, come to a common word. Let's put the country's interest before our own interests.

We tell the president, do not demolish this house, because we see what happened in other countries when the entire house was demolished. Our projects and parties.

  • During your attendance at a seminar for the "Citizens Against the Coup" campaign, you described President Qais Saeed as a dictator, and he answered indirectly that he would not be a dictator at his age.. How did you find his statement?

It is strange that the president denies his dictatorial orientation and asks: Will he become a dictator at this age?

The question he should ask him is: What is the definition of dictatorship, regardless of the age of the dictator?

Is not dictatorship is the concentration of all powers in the hands of one person and the abolition of the rest of the independent legislative and judicial authorities, which represent a guarantee for the rule of law and freedoms and a guarantee against injustice and oppression.

And in order for the president to avoid the title of dictator, he was obligated to subjugate the judiciary so that the latter would strike the president’s opponents in the name of the law and without the president being directly involved in targeting his opponents. Fulfilling instructions is an essential part of the president's plan for absolute control.

  • How do you view the president's move to dissolve the Supreme Judicial Council and replace it with a temporary one?

It is another violation of the constitution, the law, and the laws in force internationally, and a denial of what President Qais Saeed himself announced that he does not want hegemony or interference in the judicial authority. We appreciate that President Saeed will work to achieve it, which is to seize all the powers of institutions and structures independent of the powers he has granted himself and to dominate everything.

It is clear that President Qais Saeed used the same approach that was used with Parliament: media distortion, attacks and direct accusations, incitement against the target institution and inviting his supporters to demonstrate against it, and then proceed to the last step, which is to finish off the prey, although the popular response was non-existent, rather it constituted a scandal. After the president called from the headquarters of the Ministry of Interior for citizens to come out to demand the dissolution of the Supreme Judicial Council, and despite this failure, he went ahead with his plan, which aims to control all authorities in a way that has not happened in Tunisia since its independence, even during the era of dictatorship.

  • Some considered that dissolving the Supreme Judicial Council in Tunisia and replacing it with another might pave the way for political trials that might target you personally.. What is your comment?

If the matter was confined to one person, he would have, when the authorities gather in one hand and the golden rule of fair rule is absent, the rule of separation of powers, which limits the dangerous effects of the fact that man is wrong and selfish, and only freedom and the separation of powers and the establishment of some of them as a watchdog over others and the limitation of his powers Otherwise, everyone is threatened.

What President Saeed is actually doing is not targeting me personally, but rather targeting the institution that specializes in legislation and oversight over the executive authority, including the authority of the president. Hope for the sons of our country bereaved with a dictatorship, assuming that it has been alienated forever.

For us in the Ennahda movement, we do not have any personal enmity or targeting his honorable person. We elected him with confidence in his cleanliness and integrity as a legal man, waiting for him to set an example in that.

  • Do you fear that President Kais Saied will take a decision to dissolve the Ennahda movement?

We in the Renaissance movement have no fear of any judicial path under the independent and free judiciary, just as our movement did not receive its birth certificate from anyone other than its people with the permission of the Creator, and therefore it is not afraid to receive a death certificate from anyone other than its people, with the permission of God, and how many We received awareness, but we were still alive, and we increased our life thanks to God and the repeated support of our people for nearly half a century. Rather, they are natural rights that were usurped from us and the revolution came to dust them.

There is no fear for the Ennahda movement nor for the rest of the parties, as there is no administrative decision, so how many titles of an existing party does not exist in reality.

  • The Presidency of Parliament spoke about a recent visit of a European parliamentary delegation to assess the general situation in Tunisia.. Can we have details about the nature of the visit?

This visit has not yet been confirmed, and we welcome all those who stand in solidarity with Tunisian democracy, which gave hope in the world that democracy is possible in the Arab world.

  • There are those who criticize you, even the president himself, under the pretext of bullying foreigners by mobilizing international public opinion and warning of the collapse of the democratic process in the country.. Do you consider this a legitimate tool to preserve the gains of the revolution?

Tunisia is not isolated from its regional or international surroundings. It is part of the democratic system in the world. It has enjoyed and enjoys a lot of financial and economic support on the basis of its democratic legal structure. Therefore, the threat to the democratic path is in fact a threat to the bread of Tunisians, their security and their foreign relations.

Tunisia has many friends in the world, and we are keen to communicate with everyone to benefit our country and enhance its position, in our official capacity as Speaker of Parliament, in our political party capacity, and as citizens concerned through our relations with our counterparts in parliaments in defending our country and the interests of our state.

While the country is facing a stifling economic crisis that threatens the livelihood of Tunisians and the continuation of the state, it is necessary that we stop our political differences temporarily, and that all our parties and institutions mobilize to defend the image of our country as a model of democracy in a way that serves the country’s higher interests, putting aside our differences.

  • Your house has recently been surrounded by the defense committee for leftist leaders, Mohamed Brahmi and Shukri Belaid, on the pretext of your involvement in the file.. How did you see this step?

My house was not besieged, but there were a few people gathered not far away, yet what happened is a dangerous precedent because raiding the homes of opponents is the work of militias, because homes have their sanctity according to law, custom and morals.

We consider that many of those who speak in the name of the martyrs Belaid and Brahmi are trading their blood, and the investment in blood has become what motivates the behavior and discourse of this body, so they repeat their assassination time after time with great care to cover the truth. We demand that the killers of Belaid be revealed because we are the first victims targeted by this assassination, All the events were true, as we lost two governments because of these two assassinations.

Everyone knows that the Defense Committee is the one who wants this file to remain an open wound to further invest it in various ways, including investing it politically against their opponents who were never able to defeat them through the fund. It is this committee that submitted objection after objection to delay consideration of the case and prevent closing the bloody file .

I also say that it is a shame that the blood of the two martyrs, Belaid and Brahmi, is used to legislate the coup and attack the judiciary, especially that the slain - may God have mercy on them - were those who defended the rule of law and institutions. These files are under the independent and free judiciary.

We have confidence in the independent Tunisian judiciary until this moment, but the recent developments targeting the independent judiciary to turn it into a job, as President Qais sees (the judiciary of instructions), could, therefore, affect our confidence in its steadfastness in the face of pressures from the president who wants to remove his opponents by serving the instructions, and therefore he drummed And crowed to the dictatorship of Qais, the missionaries of the return of tyranny.

We are following developments, and if some are recruited into the Tunisian judiciary, we may resort to calling for arbitration by another impartial body that is not subject to the pressures of the president and his allies.

  • Contrary to what some leaders of the Ennahda movement and those opposed to the president used to say, your exit to the street was not a decisive factor in the president's path, but rather increased his insistence on completing his political project.. Are there alternatives to the street?

There are no mechanisms to resist tyranny except for a peaceful and civil struggle. We are keen on our country, the interests of our people, its security, stability, and the bread of Tunisians. Going out to the street is important, but very important, because the coup was based on a lie that the street is with it, and those who took to the street explained that the majority left its street. Consecutive times against the coup against dozens, which confirms that in the country today there is only one street that rejects the coup, and that Qais Saeed is unable to provide actual popular support, and if he ever had support, he has lost it.

Today and every day, the coup loses its legitimacy, and in any case there is no legitimate coup, the claim of legitimacy is a lie, and the legitimacy that it claims is exposed in a vacuum and reveals that the truth is that the Tunisians in their extreme majority are not with him.

  • The leader of the Ennahda movement, Noureddine Al-Buhairi, continues his hunger strike in protest against his being under house arrest without any judicial decision. How do you see the authorities' handling of the Al-Buhairi file?

What Qais Saeed did with Professor Noureddine through kidnapping and enforced disappearance is a crime against humanity according to international law, and this has put all state institutions in the position of an outlaw and the aggressor in all its chapters, and the crime that Professor Al-Buhairi - who resists with an empty stomach and a corroded body - was subjected to. The brutality and arrogance of the coup is testimony and further evidence of the extent of the deterioration that the coup has reached.

They kidnapped him and then began to search their books for any accusation to justify his arrest. They did not find anything that could withstand an independent judiciary. They had to leave his way and he would emerge victorious. So they became arrogant and ignorant, not knowing what they were doing. Professor Noureddine continued to melt like a candle dying sweat and sweat. Is this not an incitement? On violence, O servants of God, as his lawyer wife, Professor Saeeda, cried?!

  • Progressive political parties: the Democratic Current, the Republican Movement, and the Ettakatol, announced an initiative to launch a "national political dialogue" without the Ennahda movement or the President of the Republic.. How do you see this step?

We are aware of the fears of some political parties about the alternatives to the coup and their fear that this will benefit this or that party at the expense of the rest of the parties, and we understand them and are ready to interact with them positively through dialogue.

We say that the fall of the coup must be in the interest of everyone alike, in the interest of the whole country and in the interest of democratic Tunisia and its people, and that through dialogue we can reach consensus and concessions about alternatives and about the reforms that the country needs, whether at the political or economic level.

I say that there is no meaning in any dialogue based on exclusion, as the one who argues is arguing with the one who disagrees, Tunisia accommodates everyone, and there is no exit from the tunnel of crisis except through unconditional dialogue that does not exclude anyone except from the extreme of himself.

The Tunisian General Labor Union had launched an initiative for national dialogue, and we have supported this initiative since its introduction and we still support it, as the need for this national dialogue today is more emphasized than the need for it when the initiative was launched more than a year ago, we called for a dialogue that does not exclude anyone in all The stages of our struggle against tyranny, and the stages of building the democratic path.

  • To what extent do you think the Tunisian president can go in his political project?

    Do you fear the "worst"?

Does Qais Saeed project?

After two years of his rule and the rule of those he chose, we only see demolitions and no construction project, and therefore we fear for Tunisia and the Tunisian people that the economic crisis will worsen and the country will collapse, but we have confidence that the seed of goodness that exists in this great people who was The source of the Arab Spring will defend its revolution, its freedom, and democracy, which is the only guarantor of its security, rights and future.

I am fully confident in this people that they will be able to get out of this predicament with the seeds of freedom that have been entrenched in a new generation that will open their consciousness to freedom and will not accept the return of the Dawn visitors system, the wooden media, the system of popular committees, referendums, consultations on scale, and the representatives of the lottery system.