Tunisia Senate grants leader wide powers

TUNIS (AFP) -- Tunisia's Senate agreed unanimously Wednesday to grant wide powers to the interim president struggling to restore order to the country following the overthrow of ex-leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

The upper house followed the lead of the lower house of parliament which on Monday authorized interim president Foued Mebazaa to rule by decree.

"We are coming under social pressure because of the demands of the people for improvements to their situation," caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed Ghannouchi told the house before the vote.

"But it has to be taken into account that the state is not yet capable of responding to all these demands. We do not have a magic wand."

Even as he spoke a stray bullet from the gun of a soldier who fired warning shots to disperse a crowd in Tunis wounded a 26-year-old man, witnesses said.

They said the crowd of jobless people had massed outside the social affairs ministry, which on Tuesday began distributing a dole to the handicapped and unemployed.

The shots were fired as the crowd refused to line up before the offices opened but instead tried to force a way in, the witnesses said.

The measures voted by parliament empowers Mebazaa to sidestep the assembly made up mostly of followers of Ben Ali and decide key issues by decree, relating notably to the transition to democracy and the holding of elections within six months.

These include a possible general amnesty, human rights legislation, the organization of political parties and a new electoral code.

Ghannouchi said that parties banned under Ben Ali would be made legal within days ahead of "transparent and fair elections with the participation of all the parties."

The transitional government has banned Ben Ali's ruling party, the Constitutional Democratic Assembly, and accused loyalists of the former leader ousted on January 14 of attempting to foment unrest so as to block the transition to democracy.

Mass protests sparked partly by poverty and unemployment erupted across the country last month, resulting in Ben Ali's ouster. Pockets of unrest remain and police, closely associated with the hated Ben Ali regime, have played no role in restoring law and order.

On Tuesday the government called up reservists to bolster the army which has been carrying out security duties to help keep order.

Some 234 people have been killed during the unrest in Tunisia and 510 have been injured, an official source told AFP on Tuesday. The United Nations last week had put the figure at 219.

Ghannouchi Wednesday called on Tunisians to return to work, saying the country had suffered "considerable losses" because of the unrest.

The head of the Tunis-based African Development Bank, Donald Kaberuka, told AFP the bank would be prepared to give Tunisia substantial additional funding to help it face up to immediate problems.

And a group of French travel agents visiting the country said they planned a strong promotional drive to encourage the return of tourists within weeks. The industry, one of Tunisia's main sources of income, saw a 40 per cent drop in revenue in January and February is expected to be similar.

Tourism Minister Mehdi Houas said that with the eventual lifting of the curfew and the return of security, "We are counting on a real recovery around March-April."

Source: Ma'an News Agency.
Link: http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=358550.