'Too early' to discuss role in govt: Tunisia's Ennahda

By Rashid al-Jarai

TUNIS (AA) – Tunisia’s Ennahda movement announced that it was "still too early" to discuss its potential participation in an incoming government of national unity.

Chairman of the Shura (Consultative) Council of the Ennahda Movement, Abdelkarim Harouni, said in statements this week that his movement will join the consultations over the new government, but it is early to talk about the participation in the government before the end of the discussions.

“Ennahda is ready for effective participation in forming the national unity government, and it is keen to have a national unity government that includes the largest number of political parties,” Harouni said.

Harouni also noted that, “Ennahda did not object for the Prime Minister-designate to be a follower of the Nidaa Tounes party,” and that the movement calls for the need to “respect the results of the 2014 elections.”

Ennahda has 69 seats on the 217-member parliament, followed by Nidaa Tounes, which has 67 seats.

On Thursday, three opposition parties announced their withdrawal from the national unity government consultations.

In a joint statement, the parties -- the Movement of People, the Social Democratic Path and the Republican Party -- said the consultations would only lead to a "government of partisan interests".

On Wednesday, President Beji Caid Essebsi appointed Youssef Chahed, a former local development minister, as new prime minister and tasked him with drawing up a new government.

Chahed’s appointment came four days after parliament voted to withdraw confidence from the government of former Prime Minister Habib Essid.

On Thursday, Chahed announced that he planned to hold meetings with "all parties and national institutions". He denied that the new government would be drawn up on partisan lines, stressing that his government would be a "young government" and would include a number of female members.

A relatively young politician, Chahed entered Tunisia’s political arena following a 2011 popular uprising that toppled longstanding President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.

Chahed helped found Tunisia’s Tareeq al-Wasat ("Middle Way") party in the summer of 2011. The party was later merged with the centrist Nidaa Tounes party, which has led the government since 2014.

Tunisia was the birthplace of the "Arab Spring" uprisings that swept the Middle East and North Africa in 2011 and forced several autocrat leaders out of power, including Tunisia’s Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.

Since Ben Ali’s ouster, Tunisia had seen seven different governments.