Tunisia's Brotherhood using old trick to return to political stage
The Ennahda movement, the Muslim Brotherhood branch in Tunisia, works hard to cover up the corruption files in which its members and senior officials are involved.
The movement tries, meanwhile, to
put itself in order again so that it can return to the streets to compensate
the political losses it sustained in the past months.
Rifts have rocked Ennahda, with some
of the members and the leaders of the movement quitting it and searching for
alternative movements and political forces.
New party, old tricks
Ennahda tries to return to the
Tunisian political scene with an old trick.
Two movement officials, who resigned
from it a few months ago, are now founding a new political party.
The new party, which they describe
as 'independent', contains a large number of former Ennahda members within its
ranks.
The announcement about the founding
of the new party coincided with an announcement by a former member of the
Tunisian parliament and a close associate of Ennahda's head, Rached Ghannouchi,
namely Tamina Zoghlami, that she would quit the Tunisian political stage
altogether.
The new party will potentially draw
in a large number of the members of Ennahda who submitted resignation from the
movement.
around 113 movement leaders,
including former members of parliament and members of the movement's executive
office, had submitted their resignation from the movement on September 25,
after accusing Ghannouchi and some of his close associates of monopolizing
decision-making.
Those resigning included some of the
most important leaders of the movement.
The founding of a new party by the
former members of Ennahda is raising questions on the extent to which the new
party would be independent from the movement.
Some people believe the new party
would only be a new front for the movement.