Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain

Top Menu

  • About US
  • Join US
  • Videos
  • Infographics
  • Comment
  • Question and Answer
  • Watch us Live

Main Menu

  • Home
  • Viewpoint
  • Islamic Culture
  • Da’wah
  • Media
  • People
    • Sheikh Taqiuddin an-Nabahani (Founder)
    • Sheikh Abdul Qadeem Zallum (Successor)
    • Sheikh Ata Abu Rashta (Ameer)
    • Abdul Wahid
    • Abu Yusuf
    • Jamal Harwood
    • Taji Mustafa
  • Books
  • Youth
  • Covid-19
  • About US
  • Join US
  • Videos
  • Infographics
  • Comment
  • Question and Answer
  • Watch us Live

logo

Header Banner

Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain

  • Home
  • Viewpoint
    • Making Sense of Pakistan

      April 16, 2022
      0
    • How Should We View the War in Ukraine?

      March 30, 2022
      0
    • The India Hijab Issue from an Islamic Perspective

      March 24, 2022
      0
    • DEEP DIVE: The Weaponisation and Politicisation of British Citizenship Laws

      March 12, 2022
      0
    • Our Role in the Ukraine war is to Expose the Propaganda

      March 2, 2022
      0
    • Muslims Should Rejoice Over the Islamic Ruling System

      January 21, 2022
      0
    • Another Warmonger Honoured for Serving the British Elite

      January 2, 2022
      0
    • The Golden Jubilee of Bangladesh Victory Day (Bijoy Dibos): a cause for ...

      December 13, 2021
      0
    • Playing Politics with the Uygher Muslims

      December 2, 2021
      0
  • Islamic Culture
    • Reading Quran

      The story of the man who was told to “Enter Paradise” and ...

      January 24, 2022
      0
    • Significance of Rabi’ul-Awwal

      October 10, 2021
      0
    • Virtues of the Month of Muharram

      August 10, 2021
      0
    • The significance of first 10 days of Dhul Hijjah

      July 10, 2021
      0
    • The Honour of the Prophets

      April 30, 2021
      0
    • A to Z of Ramadan

      April 19, 2021
      0
    • The Dawah to Allah (swt)

      December 29, 2020
      0
    • Miracle of the Quran

      Q & A - Compilation of The Holy Quran During the Reign ...

      December 27, 2020
      0
    • Imam Bukhari: A Role Model for the ‘Ulema and Da’wah Carriers to ...

      November 17, 2020
      0
  • Da’wah
    • Public Demonstration - Independence Not Intervention

      April 22, 2022
      0
    • VIDEO : [LIVESTREAMED] Pakistan in Crisis: The Players, Politics, and People

      April 20, 2022
      0
    • Ramadan Message: The World Needs Islam - We Must Work for the ...

      April 1, 2022
      0
    • The India Hijab Issue from an Islamic Perspective

      March 24, 2022
      0
    • Ramadhan event: Kyiv to Kabul: The World Needs Islam

      March 20, 2022
      0
    • Obituary of a Dawah Carrier Dr. Youssef Haj Youssef

      December 30, 2021
      0
    • Open Letter to Imams and Muslim Leaders

      September 28, 2021
      0
    • Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain Sends Delegation to Chinese Embassy Condemning the Inhumane Treatment ...

      June 30, 2021
      0
    • Jahangir Raja: Obituary of a Da’wah Carrier

      June 28, 2021
      0
  • Media
  • People
    • Sheikh Taqiuddin an-Nabahani (Founder)
    • Sheikh Abdul Qadeem Zallum (Successor)
    • Sheikh Ata Abu Rashta (Ameer)
    • Abdul Wahid
    • Abu Yusuf
    • Jamal Harwood
    • Taji Mustafa
  • Books
  • Youth
  • Covid-19
News Watch
Home›News Watch›Ennahda and allies agree that Tunisian constitution will make no place for faith

Ennahda and allies agree that Tunisian constitution will make no place for faith

By Press Editor
November 7, 2011
836
0
Share:

(Reuters) – Tunisia’s Islamist-led government will focus on democracy, human rights and a free-market economy in planned changes to the constitution, effectively leaving religion out of the text it will draw up, party leaders said.

The government, due to be announced next week, will not introduce sharia or other Islamic concepts to alter the secular nature of the constitution in force when Tunisia’s Arab Spring revolution ousted autocrat Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in January.

“We are against trying to impose a particular way of life,” Ennahda leader Rachid Ghannouchi, 70, a lifelong Islamist activist jailed and exiled under previous regimes, told Reuters.

Tunisian and foreign critics of Ennahda, the moderate Islamist party that won 41.7 percent of Tunisia’s first free election on Oct. 23, have voiced fears it would try to impose religious principles on this relatively secular Muslim country.

Interviews with politicians and analysts revealed a consensus that the new assembly, the first to emerge from the Arab Spring uprisings, will focus on reassuring Tunisian voters, and the foreign tourists and investors vital to its economy.

All parties agreed to keep the first article of the current constitution which says Tunisia’s language is Arabic and its religion is Islam. “This is just a description of reality,” Ghannouchi said. “It doesn’t have any legal implications.

“There will be no other references to religion in the constitution. We want to provide freedom for the whole country,” said the Islamist leader, who will not take any official role in the new government. The new constitution is due in about a year.

NO LAW TO PROMOTE FAITH

Ghannouchi’s reformist Islamist writings in the 1980s and 1990s helped influence Turkey’s current mix of Islam and democracy, and he said his 22 years of exile in London helped him see the importance of civil society in influencing politics.

Like Turkey, Tunisia had decades of secularist dictatorship before evolving into a democracy where moderate Islamists — dubbed “Muslim Democrats” in a take-off of Europe’s Christian Democrats — have emerged as a strong political force.

“Law by itself doesn’t change reality,” Ghannouchi said at Ennahda’s headquarters, a six-story building abuzz with the excitement of open politics after decades of dictatorship.

“There shouldn’t be any law to try to make people more religious,” said Ghannouchi, whose party has pledged to continue to allow alcohol and Western dress here and pursue economic policies favouring tourism, foreign investment and employment.

The Islamist leader said he interprets sharia, the ill-defined and often confusing complex of Islamic teachings and laws, as a set of moral values for individuals and societies rather than a strict code to be applied to a country’s legal system.

“Egypt says sharia is the main source of its law, but that didn’t prevent (deposed President Hosni) Mubarak from being a dictator,” he said, noting the explicit reference to sharia in Cairo’s constitution.

 

POTENTIAL SECULARIST ALLIES AGREE

Samir Ben Amor, a leader of the secularist Congress for the Republic party due to join a coalition with Ennahda and another non-religious party, agreed there was no dispute about maintaining the brief reference to Islam in the first article.

He said there was wide agreement among political parties to strengthen democracy in the constitution by referring to international human rights conventions. “We want a liberal regime,” he said.

Although all parties agreed to defend Tunisian women’s rights, some of the most advanced in the Arab world, Ben Amor said they could not agree to some feminists’ demands to have the country’s liberal Personal Status Code written into the constitution.

“No constitution in the world has that,” he explained. These rights would be protected through legislation, he added.

The main area of disagreement seems to be whether Tunisia should opt for a parliamentary system, which Ghannouchi said he preferred after seeing British politics at first hand, or the French-style mix of a directly elected president and parliament preferred by the other parties.

“The parliamentary system can lead to political instability and, coming out of a dictatorship, we don’t think we can risk that,” Ben Amor said.

Radwan Masmoudi, Tunisian-born director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID) in Washington, said last month’s elections showed the country had opted for an “evolutionary revolution” that avoided radical changes.

“Tunisians agree on almost everything,” he said in the CSID office here. “They want to keep their identity as Arab and Muslim but not live in a theocracy.

“I think Tunisia can pave the way for other Arab countries to build a true democracy that is fully compatible with Islam.”

Masmoudi said the realities of coalition parties and the probable need for a two-thirds majority to approve the constitution would force all parties to seek a broad consensus.

Reuters

Previous Article

75,000 women converts to Islam in last ...

Next Article

Osman Bakhach on the struggle for the ...

0
Shares
  • 0
  • +
  • 0

Related articles More from author

  • News Watch

    UK’s £10tn debt timebomb could harm economy for decades

    November 9, 2010
    By Press Editor
  • News Watch

    Betting-shop machines sucking cash out of communities … what predatory capitalism looks like

    January 7, 2014
    By Editor
  • News Watch

    How materialism makes us sad

    May 12, 2014
    By Editor
  • News Watch

    Russia Signs Deal for Syria Bases; Turkey Appears to Accept Assad

    January 20, 2017
    By News Desk
  • News Watch

    Palestinian Authority arrests 13 Hizb ut-Tahrir members in crackdown

    July 15, 2011
    By Press Editor
  • News Watch

    Iraq war logs: secret files show how US ignored torture

    October 23, 2010
    By Press Editor

Leave a reply Cancel reply

Liberate Al Aqsa

Join US on Telegram

Podcast

Latest Posts

Press Releases

Protest in London Says No To More Democracy, Yes to the Khilafah

Members of Hizb ut Tahrir in Britain, alongside supporters from the Muslim community, gathered on Saturday 7th May 2022 at the Pakistan High Commission in London to protest against US ...
  • Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain to Protest American Interference in Pakistan’s Politics

    By Yahya Nisbet
    May 1, 2022
  • Public Demonstration – Independence Not Intervention

    By Editor
    April 22, 2022
  • VIDEO : [LIVESTREAMED] Pakistan in Crisis: The Players, Politics, and People

    By Editor
    April 20, 2022
  • The Geopolitics of Badr

    By Editor
    April 17, 2022
  • Making Sense of Pakistan

    By Editor
    April 16, 2022
  • Muslims in Britain Should Speak Out Against the Pakistani Leadership’s Surrender of Kashmir

    By Yahya Nisbet
    April 15, 2022
  • Muslims in Britain should support the call for the Khilafah in Pakistan

    By Yahya Nisbet
    April 12, 2022
  • Press Centre