Maya Jribi
Maya Jribi was the first woman to become secretary-general of a major political party in Tunisia — and the second in the Maghreb region — when she was appointed secretary-general of the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) on December 25th, 2006. According to Jribi’s blog, “I am a feminist and I will continue to defend the principle of gender equality…I position myself as a politician and not as a woman among politicians. I am where I need to be and with my colleagues, I will work in a collegiate atmosphere.”
Jribi was born in 1960 in Bou Arada to an Algerian mother and a Tunisian father from Tataouine. She grew up and began her studies in Rades, before continuing her education at the Faculty of Sfax from 1979-1983, where she was an active member of the General Union of Tunisian Students. Jribi’s human rights activism in her youth prompted her to join the Tunisian League for Human Rights in the early 1980s, as well as to collaborate with the weekly newspaper Erraï (L’Opinion), and later Al Mawkif.Â
Jribi continued her social activist lifestyle, founding the Association of Research on Women and Development in the 1980s, and working on the implementation of various social projects, such as providing aid to poor women living in Mellassine, Tunis. She also worked for UNICEF and was in charge of fund-raising and communications for the organization.
In 1983, Jribi collaborated with the lawyer Ahmed Najib Chebbi to create the Progressive Socialist Rally (RSP), which became the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) — one of the leading Tunisian political parties — in 2001. According to Jribi, “The party gathers together different currents, from former Marxists to progressive Muslims to activists for democracy. We are trying to unite them under a common program, setting aside partisanship.” In 1986, she was one of the few females to be appointed to the leadership of the party, and on December 25, 2006, she was elected Secretary General of the PDP, succeeding Chebbi himself, and becoming the first woman to head a political party in Tunisia.
On October 1st, 2007, after a court decision required that the PDP headquarters be moved from its headquarters in Tunis, Jribi and Chebbi engaged in a hunger strike that lasted until October 20th. A compromise was finally reached and a new lease was signed, however, Jribi suffered “serious biological disorders” due to the prolonged hunger strike.
As Secretary General of the PDP, Jribi has urged that her party is committed to granting fundamental liberties to citizens, and she has stressed the importance of local democracy, as well as the involvement of women and youth in politics. She has also been a proponent of modernizing The Code of Personal Status (CPS), a set of laws established by former president Habib Bourguiba aiming to guarantee equality between Tunisian men and women.
Jribi currently heads the PDP’s electoral list in Ben Arous for the upcoming Constituent Assembly Elections in October. The PDP’s decision to feature Jribi alongside the other party leader, Nejib Chebbi, in political ads, however, has left many voters feeling that the party has created an inappropriate cult of personality, particularly given the history of such acts during the rule of ex-president Ben Ali.
When asked about her role in adapting the PDP to life post-revolution, Jribi replied, “I am entrusted with an important mission, that of transforming the PDP, a party of resistance, to a mass party involved in electoral matters, a party ready to assume national responsibilities and to provide concrete answers to the expectations of his people.”
Sources:
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_Jribi
http://www.tunisia-live.net/2011/07/27/pdp-incites-tunisians-to-register/
http://www.tunisia-live.net/2011/08/13/controversy-over-the-code-of-personal-status-cps/
http://www.tunisia-live.net/2011/08/29/pdp-welcomes-democratic-alliance/
http://www.tunisia-live.net/2011/09/05/the-constituent-assemblys-election-a-challenge-for-the-new-tunisia/
http://mayajribi.rsfblog.org/
http://nawaat.org/portail/2009/02/05/interview-with-maya-jribi-leader-of-the-progressive-democratic-party-of-tunisia-our-youth-have-neither-hope-nor-future/
http://www.gnet.tn/temps-fort/tunisie-maya-jribi-denonce-les-preches-politiques-dans-les-mosquees/id-menu-325.html
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