A fresh report from Tunisia says the members of parliament have defied President Kais Saied order and held their first full session since last summer when he suspended the chamber and moved to one-man rule.
The report further says some 120 members of the parliament attended the online session and were expected to hold a vote against the “exceptional measures” that president Saied has used since July to brush aside the 2014 democratic constitution and govern on his own.
Tunisian president Kais Saied had called out members of the suspended legislature in the North African country, who were planning on holding what he described as “illegal” meetings of parliament.
President Said sacked the government, suspended parliament, and seized a string of powers in July 2021. In December of the same year, he announced in a speech on national television a three-month “popular consultation” with the Tunisian people after which “draft constitutional and other reforms will be put forward to a referendum on July 25”.
The assembly’s speaker, Rached Ghannouchi, head of the Islamist-inspired Ennahdha party, has called for a plenary session on Wednesday to discuss Saied’s “exceptional measures” imposed since July.
The president accused those responsible for calling today’s meeting of wanting to spread chaos.
“What happened today, the so-called ‘virtual meeting’ is illegal, because the Assembly and its bureau are frozen”. (…) The State will only recover through an independent judiciary, opposed by those who try to undermine the State, and those who desperately try to stage a coup”, accused Tunisian president, Kais Saied.
Three weeks ago, africanewswatch.com reported that President Kais Saied has continued his “revolution” of government institutions in the North African country as he inaugurated a “temporary” council of judges to replace an independent watchdog that he abolished in early February.