A warning from inside Tunisia
Recent religious violence coupled with moves by Tunisia’s ruling Islamist party to put religious protections in its proposed constitution prompted a leading Tunisian legal expert to warn Monday that the nation is taking steps on the “way of the worst.” Yadh Ben Achour, head of a key body overseeing legal and constitutional reform during the Northern African nation’s post-revolution transition, described the tension between the secular, pluralist forces that sparked the 2010-11 uprising and the more conservative religious majority that has come to the fore since the election last October of the Constituent Assembly, charged with drafting a new constitution. “The results show there’s an essential difference between the people of the revolution and the people of the election,” Ben Achour said. “If . . . the majority persists in its repeated attempts to inject polemical things into the heart of the public debate, then we may expect the worst.” Ben Achour made...