Tunisia’s Ennahda rejects attempts to abolish 2014 constitution

TUNIS, Tunisia

Tunisia’s Ennahda movement on Saturday rejected attempts to abolish the country’s 2014 constitution.

“We express our rejection of the attempts to abolish the 2014 constitution, and the tendency to unilaterally engineer the political and legal system of Tunisia,” the movement said in a statement.

It also warned against violating the constitutional structure through presidential decrees which it said could usher the government “into an open crisis of legitimacy, with dire consequences for political stability and the future of the country."

The statement also appreciated President Kais Saied's recent call for coexistence and respect for difference, while also warning against "exploiting the exceptional situation and harnessing state institutions to impose personal and partisan agendas."

On Thursday, Saied said during a meeting with three constitutional law professors that his country's crisis lies in the 2014 constitution, adding that it was no longer valid and has no legitimacy in Tunisia.

The Tunisian president ousted the government on July 25, suspended the parliament and assumed executive authority. While he insists that his "exceptional measures" are meant to "save" the country, critics accuse him of orchestrating a coup.

Experts and observers have in recent weeks sounded alarms of the possibility of the Tunisian president taking a decision to suspend the 2014 constitution.

Saied, who began a five-year presidential term in 2019, rejects accusations that he suspended the work of the constitution, arguing instead that he took exceptional measures within the framework of the constitution to protect the state from an "imminent danger."

*Writing by Ibrahim Mukhtar in Ankara