For years, members of Tunisia's dysfunctional and much-reviled Parliament were more likely to come to blows than consensus. Even as President Kais Saied locked them out of a job, froze their salaries and benefits, and placed them on a no-fly list last summer in a bid to steer the country on his own, MPs were divided over his actions and intentions.
Yet on March 30, more than eight months after the body last met in a quorum, 121 MPs gathered virtually and, in short order, voted to nullify Mr Saied's exceptional measures and all decrees he had issued since taking sole control of the country last July.
The vote, an effort pulled together through peer-to-peer meetings across party and ideological lines over the course of months, marks a profound ideological shift among many of the body's 217 members as they begin to mount what they say is an urgent campaign to face an existential threat to the democratic system and the country they serve.
"There was a sense of danger that brought us together," said Ghazi Chaouachi, secretary general of the centre-left Attayar Al Demokrati party.
The source of that sense of danger, MPs from four parties told The National, was President Saied.
The big shift
"When Kais Saied took control on July 25, there were a group of us who considered it a blessing," said Walid Jalled, an MP with the centrist Tahya Tounes party. "There was a real blockage in Parliament, problems between its leadership and the executive, and nothing was getting done."
Mr Jalled himself welcomed what was meant to be a 30-day pause, and joined a group of 28 MPs who approached Mr Saied looking for dialogue they said was not happening in a Parliament riddled with distrust and partisan politics. But the president, an outsider without a party who relies on a small circle of advisers to help him shape policy, refused a meeting.
"Kais Saied never believed in the parliamentary system," Mr Jalled said, "and he began to turn up his rhetoric to demonise all of the representatives as corrupt actors".
Still, Mr Jalled and others, including some members of Mr Chaouachi's party, refrained from criticising the president while they waited to see what course he would chart.
As the months wore on and Mr Saied took more and more unusual actions — appointing a Cabinet without a parliamentary vote, suspending large parts of the constitution, trying civilians in military court, announcing a constitutional referendum, and in January dissolving the country's High Judicial Council, all while unable to resolve the country's growing economic crisis — "we understood we were in real trouble," Mr Jalled said.
"We came to the realisation that the president is not shaken by the street, parties, foreign actors, the economic situation or anything else," said Mr Chaouachi. "Despite all this he kept going forward with his own project" to write a new constitution.
The shift among parliamentarians mirrors a shift in the larger populace, whose confidence in the president has been shaken as prices climb and corruption continues largely unabated, despite his calls to clean up society. Attempts to negotiate an emergency loan package with the IMF have failed and shortages of basic goods are widespread.
Shortly after the new year, Mr Chaouachi and some of his party members began speaking with MPs in other parties whom they knew shared their concerns, and proposed a virtual session to push back against the president.
Meetings were had and messages were exchanged outside traditional party structures, in coffee shops and over WhatsApp, as the MPs worked to ensure they'd have at least 109 members present for a quorum — and that any legislation they put forward would be passed.
"The initiation for the session came from outside the traditional majority," said Ahmed Gaaloul, a close adviser to Parliament Speaker Rached Ghannouchi, who leads the Islamist Ennahda party.
"It took a few weeks to agree on the makeup of the session, on the motion and the text of the declaration, but it was quite consensual work."
The Speaker takes a seat
One of the main sticking points among the MPs planning to meet was Mr Ghannouchi himself. The Ennahda leader, divisive even among his own party members, had developed a reputation as perhaps Tunisia's most reviled politician. Many refused to participate in the session were he to lead it, fearing his toxic image could undermine their work.
Private polling data shared with several major parties, including Ennahda, confirmed that suspicion. While public confidence and trust in Mr Saied had dropped dramatically, his popularity remained relatively high among voters, a sign that they were still exasperated with the old political regime.
"People just haven't been mobilising to defend parliament," said Monica Marks, an assistant professor of Middle East politics at New York University Abu Dhabi and a Tunisia expert. "Almost any invocation of the old parliament as something worthy of defending will be met with sardonic laughter and snide stares among a lot of Tunisians."
Mr Gaaloul said the Speaker understood this. "Mr Ghannouchi discussed this with his executive bureau and convinced the majority of his parliamentary group" — including members from Qalb Tounes and Al Karama, the two other parties in the governing coalition — "that the priority was a return to democracy".
"His stance was, 'If me stepping back will help get those who disagree with me to stand up for democracy, then there is no problem.'"
The virtual session was instead led by Tarek Ftiti, an independent MP from the interior region of Kairouan, who swiftly brought the motion to nullify Mr Saied's exceptional measures and decrees to a vote.
Within hours, Mr Saied struck back, dissolving the Parliament — a move he had only days earlier said he was forbidden from taking under the constitution — and calling for MPs to be interrogated on terrorism charges. Seven MPs, including Mr Ghannouchi, were interrogated in the days after the meeting, and pressure has mounted from the president for the judiciary to bring charges against a number of MPs.
Beyond the political battlefield
For Mr Chaouachi, the president's outsized response was precisely the result he envisioned when Attayar proposed the session — a "shock strategy" that would put pressure on the president to take more drastic actions that might unsettle the country or international community.
But not all the MPs in attendance shared the same goal. Oussama Khlifi of the centre-right Qalb Tounes said his party's aim was to "put parliament back to work for the people", a view shared by their coalition partners Ennahda.
For Ms Marks, the Tunisia expert, the session was a first step in what she sees as a long and painful political and social road ahead.
"This will be remembered in the history books as the moment when Tunisia's democratically elected parliament stood up for itself against dictatorial aims," she said. "But tactically speaking, parliament has a lot of big questions to answer right now and they're not easy questions."
Chief among those is how to right Tunisia's rapidly capsizing economy, a crisis all parties know needs a solution but for which few have clear ideas or policy proposals.
A second virtual session, dedicated to social and economic issues, was postponed after several MPs were brought to face court charges, making it difficult to secure a quorum.
"Even if this level of organisation continues and they start focusing more on social economic issues," said Ms Marks, "they still have an uphill battle to fight, as Mr Saied is playing so insistently on Tunisians' disillusionment with political party leadership and with the former parliament."
Still the urgency to get the political machine back on track, potentially with newfound co-operation and consensus, to deliver for everyday Tunisians pulses through each MP as they work. They know it is the only way they — and their system of government — will survive.
“Tunisian people are pragmatic," said Mr Chaouachi. "When hunger strikes, they'll eat their rulers.”
ALL THE RESULTS
Bantamweight
Siyovush Gulmomdov (TJK) bt Rey Nacionales (PHI) by decision.
Lightweight
Alexandru Chitoran (ROU) bt Hussein Fakhir Abed (SYR) by submission.
Catch 74kg
Omar Hussein (JOR) bt Tohir Zhuraev (TJK) by decision.
Strawweight (Female)
Seo Ye-dam (KOR) bt Weronika Zygmunt (POL) by decision.
Featherweight
Kaan Ofli (TUR) bt Walid Laidi (ALG) by TKO.
Lightweight
Abdulla Al Bousheiri (KUW) bt Leandro Martins (BRA) by TKO.
Welterweight
Ahmad Labban (LEB) bt Sofiane Benchohra (ALG) by TKO.
Bantamweight
Jaures Dea (CAM) v Nawras Abzakh (JOR) no contest.
Lightweight
Mohammed Yahya (UAE) bt Glen Ranillo (PHI) by TKO round 1.
Lightweight
Alan Omer (GER) bt Aidan Aguilera (AUS) by TKO round 1.
Welterweight
Mounir Lazzez (TUN) bt Sasha Palatkinov (HKG) by TKO round 1.
Featherweight title bout
Romando Dy (PHI) v Lee Do-gyeom (KOR) by KO round 1.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Sustainable Development Goals
1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere
2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
3. Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
6. Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all
7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
8. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all
9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialisation and foster innovation
10. Reduce inequality within and among countries
11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
12. Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and its effects
14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development
15. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss
16. Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels
17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalise the global partnership for sustainable development
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
'Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower'
Michael Beckley, Cornell Press
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
TOURNAMENT INFO
Women’s World Twenty20 Qualifier
Jul 3- 14, in the Netherlands
The top two teams will qualify to play at the World T20 in the West Indies in November
UAE squad
Humaira Tasneem (captain), Chamani Seneviratne, Subha Srinivasan, Neha Sharma, Kavisha Kumari, Judit Cleetus, Chaya Mughal, Roopa Nagraj, Heena Hotchandani, Namita D’Souza, Ishani Senevirathne, Esha Oza, Nisha Ali, Udeni Kuruppuarachchi
Volvo ES90 Specs
Engine: Electric single motor (96kW), twin motor (106kW) and twin motor performance (106kW)
Power: 333hp, 449hp, 680hp
Torque: 480Nm, 670Nm, 870Nm
On sale: Later in 2025 or early 2026, depending on region
Price: Exact regional pricing TBA
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
The specs: 2018 Nissan Altima
Price, base / as tested: Dh78,000 / Dh97,650
Engine: 2.5-litre in-line four-cylinder
Power: 182hp @ 6,000rpm
Torque: 244Nm @ 4,000rpm
Transmission: Continuously variable tranmission
Fuel consumption, combined: 7.6L / 100km
Five famous companies founded by teens
There are numerous success stories of teen businesses that were created in college dorm rooms and other modest circumstances. Below are some of the most recognisable names in the industry:
- Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg and his friends started Facebook when he was a 19-year-old Harvard undergraduate.
- Dell: When Michael Dell was an undergraduate student at Texas University in 1984, he started upgrading computers for profit. He starting working full-time on his business when he was 19. Eventually, his company became the Dell Computer Corporation and then Dell Inc.
- Subway: Fred DeLuca opened the first Subway restaurant when he was 17. In 1965, Mr DeLuca needed extra money for college, so he decided to open his own business. Peter Buck, a family friend, lent him $1,000 and together, they opened Pete’s Super Submarines. A few years later, the company was rebranded and called Subway.
- Mashable: In 2005, Pete Cashmore created Mashable in Scotland when he was a teenager. The site was then a technology blog. Over the next few decades, Mr Cashmore has turned Mashable into a global media company.
- Oculus VR: Palmer Luckey founded Oculus VR in June 2012, when he was 19. In August that year, Oculus launched its Kickstarter campaign and raised more than $1 million in three days. Facebook bought Oculus for $2 billion two years later.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
It Was Just an Accident
Director: Jafar Panahi
Stars: Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi, Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr
Rating: 4/5
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Read more about the coronavirus
Uefa Nations League: How it Works
The Uefa Nations League, introduced last year, has reached its final stage, to be played over five days in northern Portugal. The format of its closing tournament is compact, spread over two semi-finals, with the first, Portugal versus Switzerland in Porto on Wednesday evening, and the second, England against the Netherlands, in Guimaraes, on Thursday.
The winners of each semi will then meet at Porto’s Dragao stadium on Sunday, with the losing semi-finalists contesting a third-place play-off in Guimaraes earlier that day.
Qualifying for the final stage was via League A of the inaugural Nations League, in which the top 12 European countries according to Uefa's co-efficient seeding system were divided into four groups, the teams playing each other twice between September and November. Portugal, who finished above Italy and Poland, successfully bid to host the finals.
RACE SCHEDULE
All times UAE ( 4 GMT)
Friday, September 29
First practice: 7am - 8.30am
Second practice: 11am - 12.30pm
Saturday, September 30
Qualifying: 1pm - 2pm
Sunday, October 1
Race: 11am - 1pm
