Ennahda says to give confidence to Tunisia govt

By Rashid al-Jarai

TUNIS

A leader of Tunisia’s Ennahda movement said that his group will give confidence to the upcoming Tunisian government.

“Ennahda has not asked for changes in [Yusuf] al-Shahid’s government,” Ennahda’s deputy leader Ali Laaridh said on the sidelines of a seminar on Wednesday.

“We will vote for the government for allowing it to play its role at the earliest possible time,” he said.

Laaridh, however, said that voting for the government “does not mean that Ennahda approves all ministers”.

“We will present our reservation to the prime minister-designate,” he said.

Ennahda is the largest party in the 217-seat Tunisian parliament with 69 members.

On Saturday, Shahid unveiled a unity government of 26 ministers.

The following day, Ennahda’s Shura Council approved the proposed government lineup. It, however, raised a number of reservations regarding some ministers.

Tunisia was the birthplace of the "Arab Spring" uprisings that swept the Middle East and North Africa in 2011 and forced several autocrat leaders out of power, including Tunisia’s Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.

Since Ben Ali’s ouster, Tunisia had seen seven different governments.