Nobel Prize for Tunisian group that paved the way for peace
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A Tunisian coalition of workers, employers, human rights activists and lawyers yesterday won the Nobel Peace Prize for pulling the country that sparked the Arab Spring back onto a path toward democracy and preventing it from descending into civil war.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee cited the Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet “for its decisive contribution to the building of a pluralistic democracy” in the North African country following its 2011 revolution.
“It established an alternative, peaceful political process at a time when the country was on the brink of civil war,” the committee said.
The prize is a huge victory for Tunisia, whose young and still shaky democracy suffered two extremist attacks this year that killed 60 people and devastated its tourism industry.
Tunisian protesters sparked uprisings across the Arab world in 2011 that overthrew dictators and upset the status quo. But it is the only country in the region to painstakingly build a democracy, involving a range of political and social forces in dialogue to create a constitution, legislature and democratic institutions.
“More than anything, the prize is intended as an encouragement to the Tunisian people, who despite major challenges have laid the groundwork for a national fraternity which the committee hopes will serve as an example to be followed by other countries,” said Kaci Kullmann Five, chairwoman of the peace prize committee.
The National Dialogue Quartet is made up of the Tunisian General Labor Union, the Tunisian Confederation of Industry, Trade and Handicrafts, the Tunisian Human Rights League and the Tunisian Order of Lawyers.
The Nobel committee said the quartet played a key role as a mediator and force for democracy, paving the way for peaceful dialogue that countered the spread of violence.
It was formed after the July 2013 assassination of left-wing politician Mohammed Brahmi plunged the country into crisis with opposition parties boycotting the parliament.
A national dialogue led by the quartet succeeded in negotiating a transition from the elected Islamist-led government to an interim government of technocrats tasked with organizing new elections for a permanent government.
The dialogue nearly broke down several times but ultimately succeeded and has been held up as a stark contrast to the coup in Egypt that removed the elected Islamist government there during the summer of 2013.
Houcine Abassi, leader of the Tunisian General Labor Union, said he was “overwhelmed” when he heard about the award.
“It’s a prize that crowns more than two years of efforts deployed by the quartet when the country was in danger on all fronts,” he said.
Political conflicts
Mohammed Fadhel Mafoudh, head of the Tunisian Order of Lawyers, said the award was a message to all parties embroiled in political conflicts.
“To tell them that everything can be settled with dialogue and all can be settled in a climate of peace, and that the language of weapons leads us nowhere,” he said.
The announcement came the day after unidentified assailants shot at a lawmaker and prominent sports magnate in Sousse, underscoring a sense of uncertainty in the Tunisian city.
While Tunisia has been much less violent than neighboring Libya or Syria, its transition to democracy has been marred by occasional violence, notably from Islamic extremists.
An attack in June on a beach resort in Sousse left 38 dead, mostly British tourists. Another in March killed 22 people, again mostly tourists, at the country’s leading museum, the Bardo in Tunis.
The uprising in Tunisia, provoked by high unemployment, corruption, dashed expectations and decades of repression by brutal security services, was set off on December 17, 2010, when an itinerant fruit vendor set himself on fire after he was manhandled by police.
The revolution electrified the Arab world, and pro-democracy demonstrations broke out across the region, ultimately bringing down the rulers of Egypt and Libya and plunging Syria into civil war.
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