Tunisia’s Brotherhood using old trick to return to political stage

Ahmed Adel                         

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.