About the appointment of Najla Bouden: Tunisiennes, je vous aime! – Kapitalis

Najla Bouden already has the great merit of having had the courage to accept the post of head of government after her male peers turned away from it, undoubtedly measuring the weight of this responsibility in a country in turmoil. Isn’t such a decision a proof of courage, determination and pugnacity? Why be surprised? Are not Tunisians “women and more” (says our national poet Sghaier Ouled Ahmed).

Through Adel Zouaoui *

In the aftermath of the revolution of January 14, 2011, our great hope was equal to our disenchantment. Instead of projecting forward, towards the best, we have seen, powerlessly, our country backslide, decline and retreat.

A tsunami of Islamism and ignorance

Under our gaze, our society began to transform, to disguise itself. In the streets, veiled women have become legion. Even worse. Others have draped themselves in black from cape to foot, invisible and hidden as if they were a stain, a shame. Gloom was gaining more and more of our landscape. Independent and free Tunisia as we have always known it was slipping through our fingers. She was losing her colors, becoming gloomy, sad, gloomy and gloomy. We were told about the caliphate, mortmain goods, halal products. In the Assembly of the Representatives of the People, it was fiercely claimed that women should be complementary to men and not their equals. Middle Eastern and medieval preachers were welcomed with open arms to give us speeches from another age, to talk to us about the excision of girls, the superiority of men over women as a divine right, the hijab and even the niqab as a religious prescription, an obligation. Koranic schools sprouted like mushrooms all over the country in which the veil was imposed on five-year-old kids. Women who stick out their hair in the air were systematically harassed in working-class neighborhoods, when they are not sent to the battle fronts in Libya, Syria and Iraq to satisfy the sexual urges of the jihadists. The country of Bourguiba, that of the Personal Status Code having emancipated women from 1956 was darkening and crumbling. He was moving further and further away from us.

We despaired of our struggles to recover our freedoms, to regain our post-independence image. Rightly or wrongly, we believed that our struggles to re-anchor Tunisia to its republican values ​​were in vain. The Islamist wave was too powerful. And for good reason, it is financed by funds from illicit sources. We were helpless, helpless in the face of this tsunami of ignorance and ignorance. We thought we were lost forever.

Another Tunisian revolution

And now Tunisia wakes up with a start. She runs away, as she alone knows how to do, in extremis, of the precipice of extremism into which it was about to sink. On July 25, 2021, we whistle the end of recess. Moreover, on September 29 the unexpected, the unimaginable and even the unthinkable happened. A woman is appointed head of government. Never seen, never realized in all the history of the Arab-Muslim world. An umpteenth revolution that Tunisia has succeeded after all. An earthquake in this fundamentally monolithic, incredibly phallocratic and slyly macho Arab world. An Arab-Muslim world where women are invisible behind their burqas. A 180 degree turn, an about-face that took the whole world by surprise. Tunisia will continue to surprise, to challenge.

Najla Bouden is a pure product of the school of the Tunisian republic. She is a professor of geology at the National School of Engineers of Tunis (Enit). Belonging to the first generation of independence, it embodies the model of Tunisia, that of openness to the world, to alterities, as imagined and decided by the founding fathers of the nation in this case Tahar Haddad and Habib Bourguiba and many others. A Tunisian of today. A local woman, free and rebellious, hardworking and pugnacious, combative and courageous as had been other Tunisians before her, Queen Didon, Kahena, Aroua la Kairouanaise, Radhia Haddad and many others.

The new head of government will succeed in her mission. She will put her own. She will put her intelligence and her female sensitivity, her gentleness and her empathy, into this world of bullies and chauvinists that is that of politics.

A snub to these Islamist looters

His appointment as head of government is a snub to all phallocrats, chauvinists. To these turbaned boobies of Islamists who struggled to question the status of women as full citizens. To Wajdi Ghanim invited to our home to talk about the excision of girls and to Youssef Qaradaoui who accuses us of disbelief, to the deputies who described the girl-mothers, victims of goujats like them, of streaks, and to the Qatari channel Al-Jazeera who dreams of seeing Tunisia sink into anarchy.

The appointment of Najla Bouden to this high office is also a revenge to all the women beaten, infantilized, demeaned, humiliated and objectified every day that God makes. To all those who work in the fields with their backs bent and under a blazing sun for a modest sum of money while their husbands kill time in cafes by smoking hookah. To all the workers who wake up at dawn in the bad weather to go to work in the factories while their husbands are still lounging in their cozy beds. To all those who have been relieved of their share of the inheritance and even of their salaries. To all those who are harassed in the workplace. To all divorced women who are deprived of their alimony. To all the ones we killed. To Refka Cherni coldly murdered in May 20121 for not having obeyed her husband. In Mériem Ben Mohamed raped in 2012 by three police officers. In Siwar Ben Braiek murdered without any reason by a thug on October 6, 2018.

The glass ceiling is shattered

This appointment is finally a consecration to all the struggles and battles waged as well by women as by men to free Tunisian women from the yoke of enslavement, docility and servility. It is a tribute to Leila Menchari, world-renowned decorator, to Tawhida Ben Cheikh, the first female doctor in the Arab-Muslim world, to Bchira Ben Mrad, feminist and independence activist, to Radhia Haddad, activist and politician, to Habiba Chaabouni , renowned geneticist and recipient of the Loréal-Uesco Prize to Zohra Ben Lakhdar, physicist and also recipient of the Loréal-Unesco Prize, to Alia Menchari, the first Tunisian woman pilot, to name a few. But also to all the teachers, writers, journalists and doctors who work hard at work in absolute discretion and in the shadows and who ensure that Tunisia has always been one step ahead of all Arab countries in terms of gender equality.

The glass ceiling is broken once again by Tunisia which never ceases to amaze, surprise, challenge and confirm its singularity. Especially in that part of the world where allowing Saudi women to drive is seen as a revolution in itself.

On Wednesday, September 29, Tunisia rediscovered its marks, its landmarks, its colors, joy and hope for a better future after ten long years of hesitation, questioning, hesitation, haze and fog .

“Women are men’s future”, said Louis Aragon. This quote takes on its full meaning in the land of Queen Dido. The appointment of Najla Bouden to this high function confirms this once again.

Should we remind all the misogynists and chauvinists of all stripes who await the new head of government at the turn and wish her failure that all the ten heads of government appointed the day after the January 14 revolution have indeed failed and which way. Is this reason enough for them to be silent? Najla Bouden already has the great merit of having had the courage to accept this post after her male peers turned away from it. Isn’t such a decision a proof of courage, determination and pugnacity? Why be surprised? Tunisians are they not “Women and more” (according to our national poet Sghaier Ouled Ahmed).

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