Tunisia's fragmented parliament predictably rejected the coalition government formed by Habib Jemli on Friday, thus prolonging the country's political deadlock. Prime minister-designate Jemli's proposed government took months to fill positions in the cabinet in a failed attempt to cater to the country's many parliamentary blocs, none of which are big enough to form a majority. After a 12-hour parliamentary session, 213 legislators voted against Jemli's cabinet while only 73 from the Islamist Ennahda Movement and the right-leaning Karama Coalition supported it. A third of MPs abstained. On Monday, Tunisian President Kais Saied asked the country's political parties and parliamentary blocs to send him proposals for a new prime minister able to form a government, with an indication of their reasons by 16 January. Jemli's failure to win the confidence vote in parliament means that Tunisia must now restart a complex coalition-building process in a fractured parliament. If the impasse continues, the president can call fresh elections. Jemli, 60, an independent, was nominated by Ennahda, which came first in the October 2019 legislative polls but failed to secure a majority in the 217-seat parliament due to frictions between the parties over political appointments. His proposed government had included independent figures, whom Jemli said were best suited to initiate reforms to tackle the country's worsening economic crisis. An agricultural engineer by training, Jemli served as secretary of state at the Tunisian Agriculture Ministry from 2011 to 2014 under Ennahda prime ministers Hamadi Jebali and Ali Larayedh. Ennahda said its choice of him had been because he was “a person known for his competence, integrity and experience in administration.” Ennahda won the largest number of seats in the October 2019 elections, securing 52 seats out of the parliament's 217 and down from its previous showing of 69. The second-largest parliamentary bloc of the newly founded Qalb Tounes Party won 38 seats. Ennahda leader Rachid Al-Ghannouchi was elected parliamentary speaker in November. Saied now has 10 days to appoint a new prime minister, who will then need to receive approval for his government from parliament. Article 89 of the Tunisian Constitution stipulates that a new premier has a month to form a government, a period which may be extended for another month. Prime Minister Youssef Chahed will continue as caretaker premier until a new government is approved. The parliamentary vote is a setback for Ennahda, which has been directly or indirectly in power for a good part of the last nine years, and it risks delaying the reforms needed to revive the country's stuttering economy. Illustrating the difficulties of a divided political class in forming a strong and consensual government, Ennahda admitted last Thursday to having “reservations” about the team presented by its own candidate. Anti-Islamist MP from the Free Destourian Party Abir Moussi, who had earlier pledged to ban Ennahda if her party gained a majority, said she would not give her support to a “government of Ennahda and the [Tunisian] Muslim Brotherhood.” Al-Ghannouchi raised eyebrows back home when he flew to Turkey on 11 January for a closed-door meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who sought, and failed, to get Tunisia's support for his intervention in Libya. Other politicians questioned the competence of some of the ministers proposed by Jemli, and Qalb Tounes, the party of TV mogul and presidential elections candidate Nabil Karoui, whose 38 seats make it the second-biggest force in parliament, criticised the lineup for the proposed cabinet. Seizing a moment immediately after Jemli's no-confidence vote, Karoui said his party had a proposed coalition government that would include parliamentary blocs the Al-Chaab Movement (16 seats), Tahya Tunis (14 seats) and both the Democratic Reform and Future Coalitions. This new bloc would consist of 90 MPs, according to Karoui, who faces charges of corruption and money laundering. “We assure all Tunisians that we will propose a bloc with our hands extended to everyone and will consult with the president,” Karoui told a press conference early this week. Media pundits and members of civil society had criticised the proposed appointment of ministers regarded as pro-Ennahda to head key ministries such as justice and the interior. President Saied, also elected in October, has no natural allies in the chamber, and there are few signs of possible alliances to form a new government coalition. If Saied's candidate also fails to form a government, the next and most likely step would be to dissolve the parliament and hold new elections within 45 to 90 days. In 2016 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved a four-year $3 billion loan for Tunisia in return for major reforms, some of which have been disputed. Due to delays, the country has only received about $1.6 billion of the loan, while the facility ends in April and the first repayments are due in November. Since the 2011 Revolution that toppled long-ruling autocrat Zine Al- Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia, the only remaining democracy since the Arab Spring uprisings, has been trying to revive a struggling economy. However, its high unemployment rate of 15.1 per cent continues to affect the population, especially the young. Inflation at 6.3 per cent is also eroding already low purchasing power, leading to further discontent among the population.
*A version of this article appears in print in the 16 January, 2020 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly.
