Lessons from Tunisia

On 17 December 2010 Mohamed Bouazizi, a poor 26 year old fruit vendor became a household name in Tunisia. On this day, young Bouazazi’s fruit were confiscated by Faida Hamdy, a 45-year-old municipal inspector in Sidi Bouzid, who then slapped him in the face when he tried to retrieve his apples. Bouazizi then went to the municipal building to get back his property but was beaten again. He then walked to the governor’s office, demanded an audience and was refused. In protest, he set himself on fire, in front of the governor’s house, suffering 90% burn injuries which led to his death on 4th January 2011. Bouazazi’s was a symbolic protest by one man against injustice, but it caught the imagination of an entire nation. Protests started all over Tunisia against the government and on January 14, President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali was forced to flee the country.  A dictator who had ruled Tunisia with an iron fist for 24 years had been ousted by the power of the people, the revolution rippling beyond Tunisia, shaking other authoritarian Arab states, whose young people too are getting frustrated by a stifling bureaucracy and an impenetrable and intimidating security apparatus. Hours after Ben Ali fled, a Lebanese broadcaster, in triumphant tones, ended her report on the first instance of an Arab leader to be overthrown in popular protests by quoting a famous Tunisian poet….“And the people wanted life,” she said, “and the chains were broken.” The broadcaster, Abeer Madi al-Halabi, then went on to say that the day’s seismic events in Tunisia would serve as “a lesson for countries where presidents and kings have rusted on their thrones.”

The first President of Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba, was a statesman who is often compared to Turkish leader Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. He upheld the principles of secularism and had a reformist agenda. Though his regime was authoritarian, it resulted in a Tunisia with moderate political leanings and no serious ethnic or sectarian splits. Three decades later, in 1987, while faced by an Islamic rising, Bourguiba was replaced by his former interior minister, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali. Ben Ali lacked the vision of his predecessor and was ruthless in suppressing dissidence. However, economic development continued apace as witnessed by a rising middle class, with progress penetrating to the areas beyond the fossa regia - a demarcation ditch dug by the Roman general Scipio after defeating Hannibal in 202 B.C.E outside modern-day Tunis, which marked the extent of civilised territory. The fossa regia is still visible in places, running from Tabarka on Tunisia’s northwestern coast southward, and then turning directly eastward to Sfax, another Mediterranean port. The towns beyond that line tend to be poorer and less developed, with historically higher rates of unemployment. The town of Sidi Bouzid, where the revolt began lies just beyond Scipio’s line. In a sense, rising expectations along with uneven economic growth led to political upheaval. Unlike Bourguiba, who was always revered as the man who led the country to independence, Ben Ali had no particular cachet to save him. On the contrary, the mafia like corruption indulged in by him, his family and cronies raised the hackles of the poor and unemployed.

The Tunisian people, like people elsewhere in many third world countries are all too inured to the insidious corruption which pervades every walk of life. People were accustomed to seeing injustice and staying silent – a fall back to the days of colonisation. Everyone had to pay a bribe for just about everything - to get a loan, to start a business or to land a job. For fruit sellers like Bouazazi, the bribes were small, a few dinars or sometimes just a bag of fruit to appease the inspectors. But perhaps the people had reached their limit of suffering from an oppressive and insensitive government and the death of Bouazazi was the spark which set the fires burning. Demonstrations grew violent in the face of increasingly brutal police retaliation and what started as a localised incident soon consumed the entire nation and overthrew a dictator. These protests have offered a new model of dissent in a region where Islamic activists have long been seen as monopolising opposition. Even if they serve only as inspiration, the protests offer a rare example of success to activists stymied at almost every turn in bringing about change in their own countries – where governments are bereft of any ideology except perpetuating power. The very spectacle of crowds surging into the streets and overwhelming decades of accumulated power in the hands of a highly centralised, government seemed an antidote to the despair of past years. Tunisians’ grievances were as specific as universal: rising food prices, corruption, unemployment, the yawning divide between ruler and ruled and the repression of a state that viewed almost all dissent as subversion.

While the Tunisian revolt is a wakeup call to other Arab states with autocratic rulers, it holds important lessons for the subcontinent too. The situation in some of Pakistan’s provinces is more volatile and a spark could set a rebellion in the already troubled Baluchistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces and in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). India will have to keep a watchful eye on events as they unfold in Pakistan as the country is getting increasingly mired in religious and ethnic strife with the civil administration and the criminal justice system looking increasingly fragile.  But India too needs to be careful. While the democratic set up in the country gives enough space for dissent, the lack of action against high profile corruption cases has led to popular cynicism that the rich and powerful can get away with anything. This is a dangerous trend and must be curbed by dealing swiftly and expeditiously with defaulters in an open and transparent manner. The criminal justice system has to be reformed to deliver otherwise people may be forced to take the law in their own hands. The yawning gap between the haves and the have-nots needs to be addressed on priority to ensure social equity and to prevent the spread of left wing extremist ideology which has engulfed large parts of the country. A slap in Tunisia led to the overthrow of a dictator. Let us not wait for a cataclysmic event to set our house in order. The time to do it is now. That is the message which we must carry as the nation celebrates its 61st anniversary of becoming a Republic.

Maj Gen Dhruv Katoch, SM, VSM (Retd) is Additional Director, Centre for Land Warfare Studies (CLAWS)

(The views expressed in the article are that of the author and do not represent the views of the editorial committee or the Centre for Land Warfare Studies).