Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt

Joseph Daher – Can you tell us about the latest feminist mobilizations and their dynamics?

Ahlem Belhadj – Since 1956, the date of the promulgation of the Personal Status Code, 13 August has been Tunisia’s national women’s day. This year, several thousand women and men, young and old, invaded Habib Bourguiba Avenue to defend equality and individual freedoms. The call came from feminist associations, including the Tunisian Association of Democratic Women, human rights organizations and several newer LGBTIQ associations.

The demonstration is part of the Tunisian feminist movement’s long journey to achieve gender equality. It follows the battle for the constitutional recognition of women’s rights from 2011 to 2014. The feminist movements demanded the recognition of equality between citizens in a civil status based on non-Sharian laws. But there is still a lot of resistance to harmonizing laws with the constitution.

The personal status code, which has become obsolete over time, is the subject of a heated national debate following the report of the Committee on Individual Liberties and Equality (Colibe) set up by the Presidency and led by feminist MEP Bochra Belhadj Hmida. This code includes frankly discriminatory measures inspired by Sharia law: the husband as head of the family; paternal guardianship of children except in special situations; the obligation of dowry for marriages (even if it is symbolic), and especially discrimination in inheritance.

In addition to equality between men and women, the demands also concerned respect for individual freedoms and in particular the decriminalisation of homosexuality and the free disposal of your body. The alliance between the feminist movement and the LGBTIQ movement is recent. It has resulted in several joint actions and the establishment of a Tunisian collective for individual freedoms.

What obstacles do these mobilizations face?

On 11 August, the hard-line Islamists organized a march against these reforms. They claim that they are in contradiction with religion and consider that equality and individual freedoms threaten Tunisian Muslim society and that the Colibe report is a call to Fitna (civil war on religious grounds). They called for all measures in favour of equality in inheritance, dowry to be abandoned and were particularly opposed to everything related to free sexual orientation.

The ruling Islamist Ennahdha party did not officially call for this demonstration, but one of its leaders was Ennahdha’s former minister of religious affairs.

The two ruling parties, Nidaa Tounes and Ennahdha, are trying to create a climate of political polarisation in preparation for the 2019 elections. And the instrumentalization of women’s rights is the subject that works best for that. President Caïd Essebsi, who is very disappointed by the coalition with the Islamists, needs the entire female electorate who voted massively for him to be able to counter Ennahdha and to follow in Bourguiba’s footsteps and make history by establishing equal inheritance, . For its part, Ennahdha plays on religion and identity in the hope that its base will forget its failures.

The demonstration on 13 August broke the state of lethargy and demobilization ofrecent months following many disappointments and the economic and political crises. The government is disowned by its own people, and Essebsi’s Nidaa Tounes party has splintered into several pieces with a succession war over his son. The ruling national coalition has several internal conflicts. The UGTT trade union centre is calling for the government to resign in the face of neoliberal measures dictated by the IMF IMF
International Monetary Fund Along with the World Bank, the IMF was founded on the day the Bretton Woods Agreements were signed. Its first mission was to support the new system of standard exchange rates.

When the Bretton Wood fixed rates system came to an end in 1971, the main function of the IMF became that of being both policeman and fireman for global capital: it acts as policeman when it enforces its Structural Adjustment Policies and as fireman when it steps in to help out governments in risk of defaulting on debt repayments.

As for the World Bank, a weighted voting system operates: depending on the amount paid as contribution by each member state. 85% of the votes is required to modify the IMF Charter (which means that the USA with 17,68% % of the votes has a de facto veto on any change).

The institution is dominated by five countries: the United States (16,74%), Japan (6,23%), Germany (5,81%), France (4,29%) and the UK (4,29%).
The other 183 member countries are divided into groups led by one country. The most important one (6,57% of the votes) is led by Belgium. The least important group of countries (1,55% of the votes) is led by Gabon and brings together African countries.

http://imf.org and the World Bank World Bank
WB The World Bank was founded as part of the new international monetary system set up at Bretton Woods in 1944. Its capital is provided by member states’ contributions and loans on the international money markets. It financed public and private projects in Third World and East European countries.

It consists of several closely associated institutions, among which :

1. The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD, 189 members in 2017), which provides loans in productive sectors such as farming or energy ;

2. The International Development Association (IDA, 159 members in 1997), which provides less advanced countries with long-term loans (35-40 years) at very low interest (1%) ;

3. The International Finance Corporation (IFC), which provides both loan and equity finance for business ventures in developing countries.

As Third World Debt gets worse, the World Bank (along with the IMF) tends to adopt a macro-economic perspective. For instance, it enforces adjustment policies that are intended to balance heavily indebted countries’ payments. The World Bank advises those countries that have to undergo the IMF’s therapy on such matters as how to reduce budget deficits, round up savings, enduce foreign investors to settle within their borders, or free prices and exchange rates.

, in a climate of unprecedented economic crisis: inflation Inflation The cumulated rise of prices as a whole (e.g. a rise in the price of petroleum, eventually leading to a rise in salaries, then to the rise of other prices, etc.). Inflation implies a fall in the value of money since, as time goes by, larger sums are required to purchase particular items. This is the reason why corporate-driven policies seek to keep inflation down. at 7.2%, debt ratio at 72% of GDP GDP
Gross Domestic Product Gross Domestic Product is an aggregate measure of total production within a given territory equal to the sum of the gross values added. The measure is notoriously incomplete; for example it does not take into account any activity that does not enter into a commercial exchange. The GDP takes into account both the production of goods and the production of services. Economic growth is defined as the variation of the GDP from one period to another. , devaluation Devaluation A lowering of the exchange rate of one currency as regards others. of the dinar.

Few political parties supported the feminist call. The Popular Front [1] joined the march the day before and eventually took a clear position on the side of the demonstrators, the Massar (former Tunisian Communist Party) also called for joining the march, while political activists from other parties demonstrated independently of their parties’ positions.

The demonstrators chanted slogans for equality, for individual freedoms but also against the cost of living, corruption and all forms of conservatism. Will the Tunisian feminist movement once again be a driving force for mobilization?
Translation IVP, 19 September 2018