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ZbaqZbaq
25-10-04, 00:10
Tunisia's lacklustre election

By Pascale Harter
BBC, Tunis


The wide, tree-lined boulevards of Tunisia's capital are bustling with shoppers.

There's no crackle of suspense in the air, no debate at the street-side newspaper stands.


No surprises are expected in Tunisia's forthcoming elections
In fact, Sunday's presidential and legislative elections are barely making the front page - because every Tunisian knows who will win.

President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and his Constitutional Democratic Rally have been in power for 17 years, and exercise almost complete control over Tunisian politics.

Landslide victories of more than 99% of the vote have earned the president criticism from abroad, and calls by Western politicians such as US President George Bush to implement urgent democratic reforms.

Of the few legalised opposition parties, two have called for a boycott of the presidential poll.

Others simply don't seem to have their heart in the job, with presidential candidates calling on Tunisians not to vote for them, but to re-elect the president instead.

'Facade of democracy'

Just two days before polling, Tunisia's main opposition party - so weak it doesn't have a single seat in parliament - pulled out of elections.

President Ben Ali will win the election because of all he has done for Tunisia, the spectacular development and investment he has brought here

Ali Chaouch
Ruling party secretary general


Q&A: Tunisia votes
"This is a one-party state with a facade of democracy," said Democratic Progressive Party leader Najib Chebbi.

"And if we take part in the elections we will be legitimising this false process."

Ali Chaouch, Secretary General of the ruling RCD says it's just sour grapes.

"President Ben Ali will win the election because of all he has done for Tunisia, the spectacular development and investment he has brought here," he says.

It's true that a gleaming industrial park of Tunisian-owned manufacturing plants and businesses line the motorway from the airport to the capital.

Two thirds of Tunisians own their own home, and one of Africa's only tramways winds its way through the fashionable streets of the Mediterranean capital. In 1995 Jacques Chirac spoke of the "Tunisian miracle".

Tunisia implemented its own version of the French secularism law, banning the wearing of headscarves in schools and the public administration back in 1981 without much problem.

After the attack on the synagogue in Djerba in 2002, the threat of the Islamic bogeymen, appears to have been vanquished.

'Huge development'

It's a peaceful, stable, well-developed oasis in an otherwise troubled continent. But at what cost?


Tunisians are afraid to speak out

Hamma Hammami
Communist Party leader
At a Ben Ali campaign trail event for Tunisia's scientific community, people told me the president would get their vote.

"I am a scientific researcher and I am happy for everything Ben Ali has done. He has put huge investment into national scientific research," one woman told me.

"We Tunisians vote for President Ben Ali because he has really developed our country. For the last 17 years we've seen huge development in Tunisia."

"I'm voting for Ben Ali because of his past record. We're sure of what he's done in the past and so we can be sure of what he'll do in the future," said one man.

But they all preferred not to give me their names.

It's not wise to express a political opinion in Tunisia. On the streets people are reluctant to talk at all.

"Everything is fine," a young man told me, sitting at a cafe with his friends.

But once the microphone was off, he told a different story: "We are not free to say anything here. The economy is all right, life is all right, but we cannot speak."

"Tunisians are afraid to speak out," says Hamma Hammami, leader of the banned Communist Party.

"There are plainclothes police everywhere and if you are not for Ben Ali, you are considered against him. You will not get a loan at the bank, they will stop you from getting electricity at your home, you might be arrested on a trumped-up driving offence, or just thrown in prison."

Mr Hammami himself has been imprisoned for his ideas, and says he was tortured there.

'Big joke'

Amnesty International has expressed concern over the use of intimidation, arbitrary arrest and torture by the Tunisian police.

But is it, as some analysts claim, just the chattering classes who are bothered?


Ben Ali still seems to have reserves of popularity to see him through
In the sweltering heat of a packed night-time rally of the opposition Attajdid party, one man in his 20s told me anonymously: "I'm here to listen to things Tunisians want to talk about but can't. If I could speak freely perhaps I would vote for Ben Ali, but I am not given that choice."

The lack of freedom and democracy seems to be the most frequent complaint about what opposition supporters called "the regime of Ben Ali".

But some also had their doubts about Tunisia's much touted economic development too.

"It's a big joke," one man told me. "It's a lie that the economy is going well. I graduated in 1996 and I've been unemployed ever since."

Away from the polished streets, the tramways and expensive boutiques, there is growing unemployment and Tunisians earning an average wage of $350 a month are struggling to keep up with the costs of living in what has become a European city, with European prices.

The textile exports on which Tunisia depends are about to be undercut by a preferential trade agreement between Europe and China, which could result in tens of thousands of people losing their jobs.

With pro-Ben Ali flags and pictures hung outside cafes and businesses it looks as though Ben Ali still has reserves of popularity to see him through tough times ahead.

But with ever-watchful plainclothes police on every street corner, and debate in the free press deeply stifled, it's very hard to tell just how genuine that support is.


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Zine El Abidine Ben Ali (born September 3, 1936) has been president of Tunisia since 1987, only the second since its independence from France in 1956.

Ben Ali was born in Hammam-Sousse. As a young man, and a member of a group representing the Neo-Destour party, he was sent to France for military training. He graduated from the Inter-Arms School of Saint-Cyr and the Artillery School in Châlons-sur-Marne, and then continued his military education in the United States.

Ben Ali was appointed to establish and manage the military security department in 1964, which he ran until 1974. He was promoted to director-general of the National Security in 1977 after serving as military attaché to Morocco. Ben Ali returned from four years as ambassador to Poland to become head of the National Security and then secretary of state. He assumed this post at a time of increasingly radical Islamic activity. For his success in dealing with this threat to the regime he was appointed interior minister, and retained this position when he was made prime minister under President Habib Bourguiba in October 1987.

Ben Ali deposed Habib Bourguiba and assumed the presidency on November 7, 1987 (a symbolic date for his regime) with some popular support. Seven doctors signed a paper declaring that Habib Bourguiba was unfit for office.
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ZbaqZbaq
26-10-04, 15:58
Bron: Belga

25 oktober 2004



TUNIS 25/10 (BELGA/AG) = De Tunesische president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
werd zondag herkozen voor een vierde ambtstermijn van vijf jaar. Hij
haalde 94,48 pct van de stemmen. Dat blijkt uit de officiële resultaten
van de presidentsverkiezingen die maandag werden bekendgemaakt in Tunis.
Twee van de drie concurrenten van Ben Ali in de presidentsverkiezing,
Mohamed Bouchiha en (PUP) en Mounir Béji (PSL) behaalden respectievelijk
3,78 pct en 0,79 pct van de stemmen. De derde kandidaat Mohamed Ali
Halouani, behaalde 0,95 pct van de stemmen. De officiële definitieve
cijfers zullen maandag middag door de minister van Binnenlandse Zaken aan
de pers meegedeeld worden. Meer dan 4,6 miljoen ingeschreven kiezers
werden opgeroepen om hun president te kiezen uit vier kandidaten. Het was
voor de tweede keer dat er in Tunesië pluralistische
presidentsverkiezingen plaatsvonden. In 1999 won Ben Ali die verkiezingen
met 99,44 pct van de stemmen. (GOJ)

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zal die stink Belga niet even in haar bericht melden dat het zaakje van alle kanten stinkt ?

Pytaghoras
26-10-04, 20:12
Lang leve de democratie bij de Arabieren!!!!