CI VIEW: Tunisia in overdue constitutional crisis, not coup d’etat – Capitol Intelligence Group

TUNIS/WASHINGTON, DC (CI MENA) – Tunisian President Kais Saied’s decision to suspend parliament and fire prime minister Hichem Mechichi set off a long-overdue and unavoidable constitutional crisis rather than a coup d’état in the first representative democracy in Africa and the Arab world.

[President Barack Obama and Tunisian President Beji Caid Essebsi Oval Office filmed by Capitol Intelligence/Tunisia’s Express FM using CI Glass (Google Glass) at Oval Office. May 21, 2015 Express FM Chef de Service Khadija Sfar used CI Glass during Oval Office meeting]

Facing mass protest and general discontent with the Tunisian government handling of Covid-19 lockdowns and stagnant economic growth, Saied on Sunday (July 25) ordered the suspension of parliament, lifting MP immunity and declaring a 30-day state of emergency based on Article 80 of the Tunisian constitution.

The move by President Saied was called a “coup d’etat” by the founder of the country’s largest political party Ennahda and speaker of the Tunisian parliament, Rached Ghannouchi, and condemned by Tunisia’s largest labor union, UGTT — two voices that are usually in fierce opposition.

Saied’s decree shocked all of Tunisia’s main donor partners and political allies. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken issued a statement late Monday beseeching the country not to give up its hard-earned democratic gains while the National Press Club in Washington DC condemned Saeid for closing Al Jazeera offices in Tunisia and the New York Times opined on the end of the Tunisian democratic experiment and the Arab Spring.

Tarak Ben Ammar, the Hollywood mogul and one of the three founding fathers of Tunisian multi-party democracy [with Rached Ghannouchi and Tunisian industrialist Hichem Elloumi], said that he and Ghannouchi’s center-right moderate Islamist party feel they have been “duped” by President Saied whom they initially supported as a neutral outsider.

[Nessma owner and Spy Glass Media principal Tarak Ben Ammar. speaks to Capitol Intel/BBN using CI Glass following Oval Office meeting between Tunisia Prime Minister Mehdi Jomaa and President Barack Obama in Washington, DC]

Ben Ammar, whose uncle was progressive statesman and Tunisia’s first president, Habib Bourguiba, said that the country’s two closest allies — US President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi — must use their personal influence to bring all parties back to the table.

Saied, a constitutional law professor who ran on a man of the people anti-corruption platform, is the third Tunisian president elected following free and fair elections in 2011, succeeding Moncef Marzouki and Mohamed Beji Caid Essebsi.

The root cause of the present crisis in Tunisia was the failure by all political forces to establish a Constitutional Court as mandated by the Tunisian Constitution ratified in 2014.

Political infighting since 2014, and most recently in April, has denied the country the proper legal institution to decide if President Saied superseded his presidential authority by suspending parliament rather than dissolving parliament and calling new parliamentary elections.

Under the constitution, the president, parliament, and the judiciary each name four judges to the court, which then needs the approval of parliament and the signature of the president.

It remains unclear whether the country’s highest court, Cour de Cassation, can or will rule on the validity of Saied’s presidential decree.

Questions over Tunisia’s commitment to democracy and rule of law could not come at a worst time for the North African nation or for the strategic geopolitical interests of the United States and Europe.

Tunisia’s economy last year contracted by more than eight percent as the Covid pandemic ravished the country’s vital tourism sector while national debt has ballooned to over 90 pct of GDP.

Tunisia’s 2021 budget forecast borrowing needs at $ 7.2bn, including $5bn in foreign loans. It puts debt repayments at $5.8bn including $ 1bn due in July and August.

Tunisia is in middle of critical negotiations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington, DC for new lending facilities while seeking billions of dollars in private sector investment guaranteed by the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC), the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (US DFC) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).

In fact, Tunisian Finance Minister Ali Kooli and Tunisia Central Bank Governor Marouane Abassi jointly led an in-person delegation in early May to Washington, DC to hold face-to-face meetings with IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva and World Bank President David Malpass.

[Tunisia Finance Minister Ali Kooli speaks with Capitol Intelligence/CI MENA using CI Glass after meeting World Bank president David Malpass during official mission with Bank of Tunisia Governor Marouane Abassi to the International Monetary Fund (MF) and World Bank in Washington, DC on May 5, 2021]

In fact, the current crisis has effectively blocked work on a proposed $500m deep seaport in Enfidha or Bizerte by the likes of Singapore’s Temasek, Australia’s Macquarie Group and Arlington, Virginia-based Bechtel.

American interest in developing a much-needed deep seaport in Tunisia is also part of President Joe Biden’s recently announced, “Build the World Better” (BW3) whose aim is to limit China’s Belt and Road encroachment by promoting and underwriting US and alliend infrastructure investment.

Tunisia is also of critical strategic importance for both US President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister

In fact, the current crisis has effectively blocked work on a proposed $500m deep seaport in Enfidha or Bizerte by the likes of Singapore’s Temasek, Australia’s Macquarie Group and Arlington, Virginia-based Bechtel and underwritten by the US DFC and/or EBRD and IFC.

American interest in developing a much-needed deep seaport in Tunisia is also part of President Joe Biden’s recently announced, “Build the World Better” (BW3) whose aim is to limit Chinese Belt and Road encroachment by promoting and underwriting infrastructure investment.

Tunisia is also of critical strategic importance for both US President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi as the country acts as the neutral host for efforts to bring stability to Libya and a key interlocuter for Algeria, the two main suppliers of natural gas to southern Europe.

While Tunisia is a relatively small nation of 12 million, it competes with major G-7 countries on innovation and industrial capacity such as being the first nation to successfully make a cross-border sovereign digital currency transfer and the sixth country in the world to launch a commercial satellite into space.

On May 2, Tunisian blockchain and digital currency group ProsperUS founded by Walid Driss, executed a digital currency transaction from the Central Bank of Tunisia to the Bank of France, a global first proving Tunisia’s validity as a “regulatory” cryptocurrency sandbox for the European Central Bank and Bank for International Settlement (BIS).

American interest in developing a much-needed deep seaport in Tunisia is also part of President Joe Biden’s recently announced, “Build the World Better” (BW3) initiative whose aim is to limit Chinese Belt and Road encroachment by promoting and underwriting infrastructure investment.

Tunisia is also of critical strategic importance for both US President Joe Biden and Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi as the country acts as the neutral host for efforts to bring stability to Libya and a key interlocuter for Algeria, the two main suppliers of natural gas to southern Europe.

On May 2, Tunisian blockchain and digital currency group ProsperUS founded by Walid Driss, executed a digital currency transaction from the Central Bank of Tunisia to the Bank of France, a global first and an experiment proving Tunisia’s validity as a “regulatory” cryptocurrency sandbox for the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

Driss’ pioneering work in developing e-currencies such as the e-dinar won the recognition and small investment from Chicago-based Donald R. Wilson Jr, a global leader in blockchain and bitcoin transactions through his DRW Trading and Digital Asset concerns.

[ProsperUS founder and CEO Walid Driss speaks to Capitol Intelligence/CI MENA using CI Glass on the utliization of digital currency and blockchain in Tunisia and elsewhere during the IMF World Bank Spring meetings in Washington, DC. April 17, 2018]

“This was not a coup. There is still freedom of the press despite one news outlet being closed, and there Is freedom of assembly,” a senior Tunisian foreign ministry official said. “The Tunisian people’s commitment to democracy remains unchanged.”

While tension remains high in Tunisia, there are positive signs that some form of comprmise is being reached between President Saeid and parliament such as reports that well-regarded former Tunisian finance minister and PWC accounting firm senior partner, Nizar Yaiche, and Tunisian central bank governor Marounane Abassi are candidates to replace outsted PM Hichem Mechichi,

No-one should yet write off Tunisia democracy or even an Oval Office invitation by President Joe Biden to Pressident Kais Saied and the country’s new prime minister sometime in 2021.

President John F. Kennedy greeted Habib Bourguiba to the White House during a state visit in 1961 and President Barack Obama welcomed President Essebsi to the Oval Office in 2015.

Maybe the next chief justice of the Tunisian Constitutional Court will be part of the presidential/government delegation to Washington, DC.

By PK Semler in Washington, DC. For information, please call +1-202-549-3399 or email pks@capitolintelgroup.com