Has Authoritarianism Returned to Tunisia?

Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, October 2021, p. 54

Waging Peace

TEN YEARS AFTER becoming the best hope for democracy in the Arab world, many now fear Tunisia is in the midst of a return to authoritarian rule. In July, President Kais Saied granted himself full executive powers, dismissed the prime minister and suspended parliament, among other moves. Saied maintains he has no desire to become a strongman and that his draconian moves were necessary, constitutional mechanisms to combat rampant corruption.

Speaking at an Aug. 5 webinar hosted by the Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED), Amna Guellali, deputy regional director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International, noted that most Tunisians approve of Saied’s decrees. “They were met with a lot of joy and celebration in the streets of Tunisia because people were fed-up with the status quo, because they were completely disenchanted with the democratic process and they felt the need for something different,” she said. “It doesn’t mean that most people are against the democratic process itself, just that they see it as totally perverted by a corrupt political elite and that Kais Saied is going to give it a new impetus.”

Those opposed to Saied’s moves also share this frustration with the status quo, but believe the president has shoved a dagger into Tunisia’s political system. “However dysfunctional, ineffective and flawed the process was, it was considered by many as the only way forward,” because it was centered around negotiation and consensus-building, Guellali said. “For many, the decisions of Kais Saied are the antithesis of this process because it’s going back to the concentration of power into the hands of one man.”

In remarks to the Middle East Institute (MEI) on Aug. 11, Tunisian civil society activist Henda Fellah expressed sympathy for Saied’s bold actions, but said the onus is now on the president to show he has an effective and democratic plan to tackle corruption. “If Saied is really serious about fighting corruption, it is now the moment to open this fight and go in depth,” she said.

However, thus far Saied’s moves have appeared arbitrary and unfocused, and Fellah fears that “there are no clear steps for what is next.” Guellali shares this worry. “As the days go by, the lack of a clear roadmap becomes a source of concern for many in the country,” she said.

Achref Aouadi, the founder of IWatch, an anti-corruption group founded shortly after the 2011 Tunisian revolution, told POMED that there are simply too many unknowns to predict how Saied’s initiatives will unfold, though he is skeptical the president has the gumption to truly tackle corruption. “I have as many questions as you guys, and to me I’m not really that optimistic that there will be a fight against corruption in the upcoming days and months,” he said.

William Lawrence, a non-resident scholar at MEI, told the think tank’s virtual audience that he doubts both Saied’s sincerity and ability to renew Tunisian democracy. “One thing that Saied has proven so far is that he’s very good at sloganeering and firing people and putting people on house arrest, but he’s not really building up alliances for systemic reform,” he said. “Yet,” he noted, “the Tunisian revolution and the Tunisian civil society has given him incredible power that he can either wield intelligently or not, but so far so bad.”

In Lawrence’s opinion, Saied’s recent moves constitute a coup. His actions “look to long-time watchers of politics as highly problematic,” he said. “These moves don’t often lead to democratic outcomes.”

The ultimate test is whether Saied pushes a self-serving agenda or one that is dispassionately oriented toward the common good, Lawrence said. “If Saied is sincere, he would say ‘we’re going to invent a system for the president after me.’ I think if he’s insincere, he’ll try to have a reform by decree that gives him the power to make the changes now…Then you’re talking about an autocratic approach toward reform.”

—Dale Sprusansky