TUNIS — Tunisia's Islamist-inspired
Ennahdha party warned Monday against dropping references to Islam in a new
constitution set to go to referendum next month.
اضافة اعلان
The new constitution is the centerpiece of
reform plans by
President Kais Saied, who last July sacked the government and
suspended parliament, before later dissolving the legislature.
Ennahdha was parliament's biggest party and
a key player in the government dismissed in the president's power grab.
A legal expert charged with rewriting the
2014 constitution told AFP last week he would present Saied with a draft
stripped of any reference to religion, in order to further weaken the influence
of Islamist parties.
Sadeq Belaid said that would include erasing
the first article, which says Tunisia is "a free, independent and
sovereign state, Islam is its religion and Arabic is its language".
"If you use religion to engage in
political extremism, we will not allow that," he said.
In a statement on Monday, Ennahdha warned
"against attempts to attack the fundamental principles of the people, its
Arab and Islamic identity and the civilian nature of the state".
Ennahdha was the dominant force in Tunisian
politics after the country's 2011 revolution, which deposed longtime dictator
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and set in motion the Arab Spring.
The 2014 constitution was seen as a
compromise between Ennahdha and its secular rivals.
The new draft, due to be put to the people
on July 25 — the anniversary of Saied's power grab — has yet to be published
but is expected to boost the president's powers vis-a-vis parliament.
Article one of the 2014 constitution also
appeared in Tunisia's first constitution in 1959, after its independence from
France.
Ennahdha on Monday warned against
"revisiting questions that were settled by the people since
independence".
It also deplored "cheap and dangerous
attempts to instrumentalize these issues against dissenters".
The party repeated its call for a boycott of
the "so-called referendum", saying the exercise aimed "to fake
the public will in order to give artificial legitimacy to an oppressive system
of one-man rule".
Read more Region and World
Jordan News
.jpg)
.jpg)
