Why Tunisia's Islamist Party Agreed to Give Up Power

There are four fascinating political experiments going on son, in the Islamic governing political economic spheres. Like in Iran, turkey, Egypt and Tunisia. Mind you, pretty much all Muslim countries are constantly struggling with democracy, rule of law and the role of Islam. But these 4 are the furthest advanced. Iran has had the longest history of constitutionalism going back almost 100 years. Turkey started even earlier but stuttered. Egypt frankly started and has now gone back even further. Tunisia seems to be the most advanced and if I had to put money down, I would say that Tunisia will reach civilisation the earliest compared to the others. Despite the issues they are facing with assassinations and demonstrations. It's an urbanised society so the usual rural obscurantist structures are avoided. Mind you, the Bahrain example is the counter example for urbanism. Then again the gulf Arabs are particularly well noted to be a bunch of weirdass morons. There's a very good reason why Allah decided to emerge his religion in the gulf. Imagine what they would have been without it when you see what they have done up till now with it. 

But politics is this. The spirit of consensus and compromise. And religion usually doesn't allow you to do so hence the utmost importance of having a secular structure son. 

I'm hoping Tunisia can show the way to how a liberal consensus driven democratic society with some elements of Islam can be part of this modern world son. Turkey went a bit too far with the secularism so it's trying to get back into balance. Iran went totally the other way with religiously driven politics. And well you know the utter mess Egypt is in. 

So interesting days ahead to watch how Tunisia is going to play out.

Love

Baba

Rory McCarthy | Why Tunisia's Islamist Party Agreed to Give Up Power | Foreign Affairs
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/features/letters-from/lets-make-a-deal

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Three years after the popular uprising that brought down President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, demonstrations, sit-ins, and strikes have become part of daily life in Tunisia. Railway workers, customs officers, and doctors went on strike earlier this month over changes to their working conditions; next month, taxi drivers will begin an open-ended sit-in to protest rising fuel prices. Politics often seem hopelessly polarized, with Islamists led by the political party Ennahda pitted against their secular opponents in parliament in a manner not unlike Egypt’s bloody rivalries. And the assassinations of two prominent liberal politicians, Chokri Belaid and Mohamed Brahmi, by Islamist militants earlier this year brought public anger against Ennahda into the streets, as many Tunisians blamed the Islamists for a soft embrace of extremist groups. It appeared that Tunisia — whose largely functional democratic transition has set it apart from the other Arab Spring countries — would no longer avoid the violence that has undermined the other revolutions and uprisings across the Middle East.

But for the first time in a long time, the political class has reached an accord. On December 14, after weeks of broken promises and missed deadlines, Tunisia’s rival political parties finally agreed on a deal to dissolve the Ennahda-led government and create an interim administration led by a compromise prime minister. If all goes according to plan, Mehdi Jomaa, who had previously served as minister of industry, will lead a caretaker government of technocrats until elections can be held next year, most likely after the summer. It’s further confirmation that, despite their ideological differences, Tunisia’s Islamists and secularists are perfectly capable of cooperating. It’s also another sign of pragmatism from the Islamists, who in October 2011 swept the first elections after the fall of Ben Ali. Now Ennahda, an Islamist force that sees itself as both a grassroots movement and a political party, has agreed to bow to the demands of its critics and give up power.

Muslim Brotherhood's Hard-Line Platform is actually ok!

People are getting quite upset about the Muslim Brotherhood's Political Platform but I am far more sanguine about it. I quote:

The Muslim Brotherhood has laid down its first detailed political platform, which would bar women and Christians from becoming president and establish a board of Muslim clerics to oversee the government, reminiscent of Iran's Islamic state.The platform has dismayed secular reform activists who have cautiously hoped the Brotherhood was becoming more moderate and who supported the movement in the face of an unprecedentedly tough government crackdown against it.

Not a problem. Head of State restrictions apply everywhere, in the UK, you need to be of a particular family, while you have to be born in USA to be the president (which causes Arnie to rule himself out and huge opposition). Good reasons, but so do the Brothers. Its just based upon their understanding of Islam but so what?

As for having a Council of appointed or elected experts, what do you think the House of Lords, Rajya Sabha or US Senate are supposed to do? The very same thing, be the guiding hand on the elected branch of the country. The process's are different but the concept is the same.

But I like it, you see, they have underwritten the seeds of their own destruction because of two reasons. First is that they are willing to submit to civil society and second they have a large minority to handle. Both will blow the fiction of a monolithic islam as was shown in iran. There you have clear fissures and clarity that whenever people with too much religion on their brains get into power, all their common sense and literacy dribbles out, look at india, uk, iran, usa....So I am looking at the day after the night after the day the brotherhood comes to power. Yes, it might well happen that they might change their stripes and convert into hardline Islam and become an Iran. Yes? So? We have lived with Iran for 30 years, what's wrong with living with a hardline Egypt?

Oh! if you do think so, then better get in the visit to the pyramids before they get into power because they might well do a Bamiyan on them.

Also see my previous detailed essay about the brotherhood here.

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!

Leading militant in split with Islamists in the UK

This is a very interesting step. I will reflect on this further and most probably write a full length
essay on this.

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!


Rethink leads Briton to break with group Blair wanted to ban after 7 July

Peter Beaumont
Sunday September 9, 2007
The Observer

One of the most senior members of the controversial Islamist Hizb ut-Tahrir movement, the group which Tony Blair pledged to ban after the 7 July bombings, has dramatically defected.

Maajid Nawaz, a Briton who was jailed in Egypt for four years in 2002 and allegedly tortured after being accused of reviving a banned political group and plotting to overthrow the government, says that he no longer agrees with the movement's attempts to transform Islam into a narrow political ideology.

The departure of Nawaz, whose reasons for quitting have been posted on Hizb ut-Tahrir's British website, has already inspired a furious debate within the group. Although he left two months ago, he has only now made his decision public, and will be interviewed later this week on BBC2's Newsnight programme.

According to Nawaz, who joined the movement when he was 16, he reconsidered his membership during his imprisonment. Insisting he had not abandoned his opposition to the conduct of Arab leaderships or his opposition to the Iraq war, he added that he could no longer agree with its thinking.

Nawaz's defection is a major blow to the movement. Despite being only 29, he was recognised globally for his work in founding new groups abroad.

Equally important is likely to be his reason for leaving Hizb ut-Tahrir, a closely argued rejection based on a revisiting of the key legal argument that has been deployed by Islamists - including al-Qaeda - that Arab governments operating under non-Islamic (kufr) law should be removed.

He added, however: 'I do not wish my critical voice to be exploited to support the call for proscribing Hizb ut-Tahrir. Rather, those that are well versed in both party ideology and traditional Islamic sciences are sufficiently equipped and duty-bound to redress the phenomenon of politically inspired theological interpretations.

'I would also state that my political stance against the tragic invasion of Iraq remains unchanged. Furthermore, these words should not be taken to mean that I support the brutal policies of the Muslim world's dictators. Rather, political engagement is the civic duty of all who are able. Finally, I impress upon all people that Islam today is not in need of a politically inspired modernist reformation, which is actually the cause of our current crisis, rather a counter-reformation and a return to its true essence by Muslims insisting that their religion is not used merely to serve narrow political agendas.

'I spent much of my time as a political prisoner evaluating and studying Islam. It became clear to me that rather than being the sole vanguard that represents an Islam that even Muslim jurists have misunderstood, Hizb ut-Tahrir is inspired by a political ideology.'

While some of the responses to his move yesterday were abusive, some welcomed the debate. 'He has an argument,' commented one senior member. 'He appears to back [it] with texts/evidences. So let a discussion develop, a discussion free from useless feeble statements.'