The lawyer in charge of drafting a new Constitution in Tunisia publicly repudiated on Sunday the text published by the presidency, whose adoption during the referendum scheduled for July 25 could, according to him, “open the way to a dictatorial regime”.
Sadok Belaïd, head of the “National Consultative Commission for a New Republic” charged by President Kais Saied with drafting a new Constitution, had given him his project on 20 June.
But in a letter published by the newspaper Assabah and of which Mr. Belaïd confirmed to AFP to be the author, he completely dissociates himself from the text made public Thursday by Mr. Saied, who had assumed full powers there. has almost a year by dismissing the government and suspending the Parliament dominated by the Islamo-conservative Ennahdha party, its pet peeve.
The project published in the Official Journal “does not belong in any way to the one we have developed and presented to the president”, said Mr. Belaïd.
The disavowal is all the more scathing in that it comes from a respected jurist, close to the president, and that it gives credence to the accusations of the opposition according to which the draft Constitution enshrines authoritarian power in the hands of a only man.
The project indeed grants vast powers to the Head of State, marking a radical break with the rather parliamentary system in place since 2014, a source of recurring conflicts between the executive and legislative branches.
“Bad future”
“In my capacity as President of the National Consultative Commission (…), I declare with regret, and in full awareness of the responsibility vis-à-vis the Tunisian people, to whom the final decision belongs, that the Commission is totally innocent of the text submitted by the president to the referendum,” he added.
According to him, the project published by Mr. Saied “contains considerable risks and shortcomings”. He cites in particular an article on “imminent danger” which guarantees the head of state “very broad powers, under conditions which he alone determines, which could open the way to a dictatorial regime”.
It was precisely by invoking a similar article that appeared in the 2014 Constitution, that Mr. Saied assumed full powers on July 25, 2021, after months of political blockages, shaking the young democracy in the country from which the Arab Spring revolts were gone in 2011.
Mr. Belaïd also noted “the political non-responsibility of the President of the Republic” in the published text, which allows him to govern without safeguards.
“The text that I finalized after several weeks of work with the participation of dozens of experts at all levels is completely different from the text that was published to be submitted to the referendum,” insisted Mr. Belaïd to AFP, believing that the project in its current form presaged a “bad future” for Tunisia.
“Two parallel lines”
According to him, the text “reduces the legislative power, increases in a demagogic way the powers of the President of the Republic and submits the judicial system to his will”.
His text and that published by the president is so different in his eyes that he compares them to “two parallel lines”.
The amended text confirms the expected presidentialization of the regime by stipulating that the “President of the Republic exercises executive power, assisted by a government headed by a head of government” whom he appoints.
This government will not be presented to Parliament to gain confidence.
In addition, the president will enjoy vast prerogatives: he is the supreme commander of the armed forces, defines the general policy of the State, and ratifies the laws. It can also submit legislative texts to Parliament, which must examine them “as a matter of priority”.
In addition to the fact that the text considerably reduces the role and power of Parliament, it also provides for the establishment of a second chamber, the “National Assembly of the Regions”.
Moreover, it does not include any mention of Islam as a “state religion”, contrary to previous Charters.
