Following a report by the “Venice Commission” criticizing the holding of a referendum on the Constitution in Tunisia on July 25
Tunisian President Kaïs Saïed on Monday called on the members of the “Venice Commission” to leave the country, the day after the publication of a report by the said commission criticizing the holding of a referendum on the Constitution in Tunisia on 25 next July.
This is what emerges from the video broadcast on Monday by the Tunisian presidency on its official Facebook page, following the meeting between the Tunisian president and his Minister of Foreign Affairs, Othman Jerandi.
The European Commission for Democracy through Law, known as the “Venice Commission” (created in 1990), is an advisory body of the Council of Europe on constitutional matters.
Kaïs Saïed underlined that “interference in Tunisian internal affairs, as the Venice Commission has done, is inadmissible and that anyone belonging to this commission who is in Tunisia must leave the country immediately.”
And to continue: “Tunisia’s sovereignty does not tolerate any haggling. It does not have the right to demand that the electoral body be restored, or that the referendum be organized on a certain date and according to methods that she specifies.
“This is unacceptable interference, our country is not a farm or an orchard that they invade whenever they want, and they are not guardians of the choices of our people, we have no need for their accompaniment or assistance, and if necessary, we will withdraw from this Commission,” he added.
At the beginning of May, Kaïs Saïed issued a decree calling on voters to take part in a referendum on a new constitution for the country on July 25, while opposition parties called for a boycott of the said referendum.
Kaïs Saïed also decided to bring forward the legislative elections to December 17 and granted himself the right to appoint three of the seven members of the electoral body (Independent Higher Authority for Elections – ISIE), including its president.
The “Venice Commission” said that “the decree announced by the Tunisian President on May 22, calling on voters to a referendum on a new Constitution in Tunisia, is neither in accordance with the Constitution nor with Presidential Decree 117 of 2021. “
The Commission added that “it is not realistic to foresee the organization of a credible constitutional referendum in the absence of clear rules, established beforehand, on the modalities and the implications of the holding of such a referendum, in particular in the absence of the text of the new Constitution intended to be submitted to a referendum.
Tunisia has been going through a serious political crisis since July 25, when Kaïs Saïed decided to impose exceptional measures, in particular the freezing of the powers of Parliament, the promulgation of laws by decrees, the dismissal of the government, and the appointment of ‘a new.
Political and civil society actors reject these measures and consider them a “coup against the Constitution”, while other forces support them and see them as a “correction of the course of the 2011 revolution”, which overthrew the regime of then-president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
