Tunisia Has A Lesson To Teach

Saturday, January 15, 2011
Courtesy Of "The Daily Star"

After a month of civil unrest, Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali left the country Friday after calling for legislative elections within six months; this news should not be greeted with the cliché of better late than never, as it is too late for the misrule of Ben Ali to continue.

He placed power in the hands of the prime minister, but the president should not view his exit from authority as a temporary one. His call for elections and earlier pledges of some basic civil rights moves clearly did not satisfy the Tunisian people, who took again to the streets en masse Friday. Ben Ali responded to the vociferous expressions of broad popular discontent later in the day by declaring a state of emergency and imposing a 12-hour curfew from 6 p.m. local time.

After 23 years of his corrupt and authoritarian reign, the president has at last bowed to the serious and widespread popular pressure. Television footage around the world is showing tens of thousands of Tunisians disgruntled with Ben Ali’s tyranny, and dozens of citizens have died since the rioting and demonstrations began.

This new picture of Tunisia could not clash more with the image that Ben Ali pushed for the last two decades; he regaled the world with tales of the honeyed and perfumed existence of his people. The portrait – sketched similarly in too many other Arab nations – was never convincing.


Aside from the economic hardship and near-total absence of human rights, Tunisians had to suffer silently as Ben Ali, his wife and many relatives became grossly – and illegally – wealthy. Ben Ali threw money at media campaigns to sugarcoat his country’s many ills and instead attract tourists to see its alluring shores; however, ignoring problems usually fails to make them go away. In the case of Tunisia and many other Arab states, the unspoken troubles have only grown.

Tunisia’s awakening began when a college-educated youth committed suicide by setting himself on fire after police confiscated the fruits and vegetables he was trying to sell to make a living. As the protests spread, Ben Ali said he would not stand for re-election in 2014, and he promised to sharply cut the prices of food staples.

These steps are years overdue. It is tragic that dozens of people have had to die to achieve even this minimum of progress. When Hillary Clinton in Doha urged Arab leaders Thursday to embrace civil society in order to invest in the future of Arab youth, she was right.

Other Arab monarchs and presidents-for-life should learn the lesson unfolding on the streets of Tunisia: It is past time to institute democratic reforms in the Arab world, and the region’s leaders should do so before it becomes too late for them, as it has with Ben Ali.