Tunisia's dominant Al-Nahda Islamist Party may just have agreed to do what the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt could not bring itself to do: share power with the opposition in order to avoid an Egyptian-style race off a cliff. Nahda leader Rached Ghannouchi and the UGTT Trade Union Conference agreed to a UGTT proposal that would lead to talks between Al-Nahda and the opposition aimed at a power sharing agreement and a technocratic government in the run-up to new elections. The agreement today (here and here) follows European pressure for a settlement and meetings in Paris and elsewhere.
It will still take determination to make it work, but this agreement is a first step.
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So the new form of democracy in the Arab World is ---
ReplyDeleteIf you win an election but are an Islamist party, you must share power with those who didn't win the election or the military will stage a coup.
So, if the non Islamist parties win a free election, do they have to share power with the MB or the military will stage a coup?
Or is this a one way "democracy"?
Anonymous: But Nahda only had a plurality, and power sharing was required from the start.
ReplyDelete