September 24, 2014
Fifteen
Tunisian soldiers were killed on July 16 on Mount Chaambi near the Algerian
border, the deadliest assault on army personnel in nearly a year. As the
soldiers were preparing to break their Ramadan fast, about fifty armed men with
grenades, RPGs, and machine guns attacked. Recurrent hostility against the army
and security forces—as well as the assassinations of prominent leftist
politicians Chokri Belaid and Mohammed Brahmi—all of which are believed to have
been carried out by religious extremists, has generated a climate
of fear among
ordinary Tunisians. This fear is, in turn, increasingly allowing the police and
the army to take on a stronger role within state apparatuses. But while
Tunisia’s terrorism threat is real, the institutional knee-jerk reaction could risk
resurrecting a domineering police state.
Emboldening
the police has led to some instances of abuse, which have been rising over the past year. One of the most
flagrant examples is the assault by dozens of police officers in April
on a regional court in the eastern district of Sousse. The court was in the
process of trying an officer who had been convicted of arbitrarily murdering a
citizen while on duty. The National Union of the Interior Security Forces, the
most prominent police union established after the 2011 uprising, had been
demanding his immediate release. Carrying weapons and using state-owned
vehicles, members of the union besieged the court for three days and attacked
the judges working in it. Without oversight from a weakened ministry of
interior, the police unions are taking advantage of the fear of terrorism to
act with impunity.
A
similar incident occurred in Kairouan in March, when members of the same union broke
into and occupied a regional headquarters building of
Tunisia’s High Elections Committee two days after Kairouan’s governor denied
their request to use the site as a police station. The group of police officers
proceeded to replace the committee’s banner with a sign reading “Police.” Such
acts of intimidation have been on the rise in Tunisia; there were a total of
101 reported police
and army attacks on journalists between April and August 2014 and dozens more
examples of police abuses and illegal practices against ordinary citizens as
part of the counterterrorism campaign launched last August.
Amid
the increasing show of police force—which had been the centerpiece of former
president Ben Ali’s police state—the government has adopted policies that could
enable the return of old security practices. In a recent executive order last
month, Prime Minister Mehdi Jomaasuspended 157 non-governmental religious
associations for alleged links to terrorism, mostly small groups engaged in
charity and non-violent preaching. The government considered the suspension of
their work a necessary preemptive measure against their "likely"
support for extremism. Jomaa drew on an outdated 1975 law instead of following the newer,
post-revolution Law Number 88 of 2011, which stipulates that only judges have the authority
to order the suspension or dissolution of an association. The 2011 law was hailed by human rights groups and in theory
took legal precedence over the 1975 law. Jomaa’s use of an outdated law drew
sharp criticism from civil society groups and
opposition parties.
Moreover,
the government closed two radio channels and a number of
mosques it deemed to have been promoting extreme religious ideology—also
without judicial order or consultation with Tunisia’s newly created independent
media authority, the Independent High Authority for Audiovisual Communication.
By sidelining this institution and relying on outdated laws, the government
made clear its view that security concerns supersede democratic procedures.
Meanwhile,
as Tunisia’s technocratic government strives to contain the terror threat, the
country’s political actors are battling to gain control of the terrorism
narrative. For instance, Rached Ghannouchi, chairman of the Ennahda party, believes that Islamist violence stems from the
deep state’s attempts to sabotage the democratic process. The opponents of
Ennahda believe the party is responsible for Tunisia’s political assassinations
and recent attacks on military personnel because it allegedly gave too much
leeway to religious extremists following the 2011 revolution. This line of
reasoning is often used to justify the government’s recent crackdowns, along
with police impunity, as necessary measures to ensure stability. However, the
security forces are receiving uncritical support from the anti-Islamist segments
of the political elite. This brings into question the kind of role these elites
will play in terms of security sector reform after the coming October
elections.
Ultimately,
religious extremism and non-state violence are serious problems in Tunisia. But
in the long run, countering such threats with authoritarian repression and
manipulations of the law could doom Tunisia’s fragile transition. Extreme state
oppression has often caused radicalism to flourish rather than die out. The
absolutist security state stance of Tunisia’s old elites is more likely to
undermine freedoms than improve security, and thus upholding rather than
undermining the country’s fragile democratic laws is critical. Tunisians will
do well to consider Benjamin Franklin’s famed quote: “Those who would give up
essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty
nor safety.”
This
article is reprinted with permission from Sada. It can be accessed online
at:
http://carnegieendowment.org/sada/2014/09/16/liberty-and-security-in-tunisia/hp2a
Omar Belhaj Salah is a Berlin-based independent Tunisian
researcher.