Tuesday, February 08, 2011

Sofia Bouderbala
Agence France Presse

TUNIS: Tunisian lawmakers voted overwhelmingly Monday to give the interim government emergency powers following the suspension of ousted leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s party.

Of 195 deputies present in the 214-seat lower house of Parliament, 177 voted in favor of the bill, 16 against and two lawmakers from Ben Ali’s RCD party abstained, said Lazhar Dhifi, a member of the social affairs and human rights commission which submitted the text.

The Senate is to vote on the bill Wednesday before it can be ratified by interim president Foued Mebazaa.
If approved by the two houses of Parliament, the text will give Mebazaa power to rule by decree and sidestep a Parliament dominated by the Constitutional Democratic Assembly, which was suspended Sunday.

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Mohammad Ghannouchi told deputies they had to approve the measure in order to bring peace to a country still mired in turmoil three weeks after Ben Ali was deposed in a popular revolt.
“Time is precious. Tunisia has real need of rule by decree to remove dangers,” he said at the first parliamentary session since Ben Ali’s overthrow.
“There are people who want Tunisia to go backward but we must honor our martyrs who fought for liberty,” Ghannouchi said.

As lawmakers debated the bill, hundreds of protesters massed outside to demand the “dissolution of Parliament.”
Interior Minister Fahrat Rajhi announced the suspension of all activities of the RCD Sunday, as a first step toward its dissolution.
Eighty percent of deputies belong to the RCD, which had a monopoly on power under Ben Ali and could still stand in the way of reform.
The RCD claims 2 million members out of a total population of 10 million and remains a well-organized political group which could mount a strong political campaign.

Under the suspension, the RDC is banned from organizing meetings and public gatherings while its offices have been shut down.

The interim government moved to suspend the party in part to stem renewed bouts of violence that have broken out after it relaxed a curfew imposed Jan. 12.

The interim government, which replaced top police chiefs and the governors of all of Tunisia’s 24 provinces just days before, had hoped the move would help calm the unrest.

But protesters and opposition politicians are calling for a more thorough shake-up, judging some of the newly named governors too close to the old regime and the RDC.
In unrest northwest of the capital Sunday 40 people were injured, one badly burned in the torching of a police station, in the town of Kef, hospital sources said.

In the southern town of Kebili, one youth died after he was hit by a tear gas canister during clashes with security forces, state news agency TAP reported.
An Interior Ministry source said that two people were killed and 13 injured, including four policemen, in street protests in Kef Saturday.

By Monday calm was restored in the town with soldiers patrolling the streets, said local union official Raouf Hadaoui.
Meanwhile, Tunisia’s prime minister was quoted Monday as appealing for international aid to help offset economic losses estimated in the billions following the weeks of unrest.

Ghannouchi reportedly said foreign aid and investment is needed “to protect the Tunisian experiment.”
Ghannouchi said in an interview published in the Financial Times Monday that the cost to the Tunisian economy of the weeks of anti-government protests is already between $5 billion and $8 billion, “and the needs going forward are even more significant.”

The prime minister says that to safeguard democracy “we must undertake massive and speedy investment in the regions, especially in the most underprivileged regions.”– With AP