Elyes Fakhfakh

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Elyes Fakhfakh (2020)

Elyes Fakhfakh ( Arabic إلياس الفخفاخ, DMG Ilyās al-Faḫfāḫ ; born 1972 in Tunis ) is a Tunisian politician. Since February 27, 2020 he has been Tunisia's head of government . On July 15, 2020, he submitted his resignation following allegations of a conflict of interest in the award of a contract.

Previously, he was a minister in the short-lived first two governments formed after the election of a constituent assembly following the 2011 Tunisian revolution . He is a member of the social democratic party Ettakatol .

Life and professional history

Elyes Fakhfakh was born in Tunis in 1972 . He studied mechanical engineering at the École nationale d'ingénieurs in Sfax , where he obtained his engineering degree. He then completed a master’s degree in the same subject at the Institut national des sciences appliquées de Lyon , a French Grande École . In France, he obtained another master's degree in business administration from the University of Évry-Val d'Essonne in the Paris region.

In 1999 he took at the age of 27 years, his professional career as an engineer at the total belonging Corporation elastomer -Produzenten Hutchinson on. After various positions in the globally active company, he became operations manager of a new plant in Poland in 2004. In 2006 he returned to Tunisia and joined the management of the automotive supplier Cotrel.

After working as a minister (2011–2014), Fakhfakh initially returned to business life. He founded a company that advises on and finances infrastructure and recovery of valuable materials in waste management . He was indirectly involved in a company that won a state tender shortly before he took office. In June 2020, therefore, allegations of a conflict of interest were raised, which led to calls for resignation against the head of government. Only after the accusations arose, Fakhfakh announced that he would sell the shares in question, which he said he had declared with his remaining assets to the state anti-corruption commission when he took office.

Fakhfakh is married and has one son.

Political career

After the Tunisian revolution in 2011, Fakhfakh joined the party Ettakatol - Democratic Forum for Labor and Freedom . Following the election to the Constituent Assembly , in which Ettakol became the fourth strongest force with 20 seats, the party entered into a coalition with the two strongest blocs. This connection between the three politically far apart partners, including the Islamist Ennahda as the largest parliamentary group, was given the nickname Troika in Tunisia and is subject to long-term controversy among the country's political public, especially with regard to the secular parties involved. Fakhfakh was appointed tourism minister to the Jebali government, which began its work on December 24, 2011. On December 12, 2012 he also took over the Ministry of Finance, which he led exclusively from March 14, 2013 and held until the end of the Larayedh government on January 29, 2014.

In the 2014 parliamentary elections , Ettakatol was punished for the unpopularity of the Troika government and did not win a single seat in the Assembly of Representatives ( ARP : French Assemblée des représentants du peuple ) established by the new constitution . Fakhfakh then no longer had a public office. In the 2019 election , the party only got 0.26% of the vote.

Fakhfakh himself did only marginally better in the first round of the 2019 presidential election held shortly before : with 0.34% of the vote, he came in 16th place. Nevertheless, President Kais Saied nominated him as a candidate for the office of head of government on January 20, 2020 after Habib Jemli, who was nominated by the Ennahda as the largest faction in parliament, failed to form a government. Fakhfakh, who resigned his party offices immediately, managed in a second attempt to submit a cabinet list to the fragmented parliament, which won the confidence vote on February 27, 2020.

The government consists of 32 members, six of them from Ennahda (Islamist, 54 of 217 parliamentary seats), three from Attayar - democratic movement (social democratic, 22 seats), two from al-Khaab - popular movement (left-wing national, 15 seats), two from Tahya Tounes - “Long live Tunisia” (liberal / centrist, the party newly founded by the previous head of government Youssef Chahed , 14 seats), one from the Tunisian Alternative (centrist, three seats) and one from Nidaa Tounes - “Ruf Tunisia” (liberal / centrist, the party of post-revolutionary president Beji Caid Essebsi , three seats) and 17 are nominally independent, mostly technocrats .

Fakhfakh Gate : Alleged conflict of interest and resignation

In mid-June, blogger and independent MP Yassine Ayari drew attention to the fact that a company in which Fakhfakh holds shares and whose business he runs had won a government tender for waste management. This represents a conflict of interest between his office as head of government and his economic activities. After several days of hesitation, Fakhfakh declared that he would sell the relevant shares. At the same time, he rejected the charge of conflict of interest. He is only indirectly involved in the company that won the tender through shareholding in a company which in turn holds shares in the company in question; He never had any direct influence on the management there. This representation was later represented in a communiqué of the group of companies concerned. The company also documented the timing of the tender, with the aim of showing that the decision on the content of the award had been made before Fakhfakh was commissioned to form a government; only the administrative processes dragged on until his term of office. In the Tunisian public, however, people have long spoken of the “Fakhfakh Gate”.

On July 12, 2020, the Choura (the highest party assembly ) of the Islamist Ennahda, the strongest party in charge of the government , spoke out in favor of talks to form a new government, which was seen as a call to overthrow Fakhfakh. In parliament, a motion for a vote of no confidence in Fakhfakh received enough support within a very short time to be formally introduced on July 15, 2020. According to media reports, President Kais Saied, who had backed him two days earlier by ruling out negotiations on the formation of a new government while the existing government was in office, has now asked him to resign. Fakhfakh submitted this on the afternoon of July 15, 2020.

Web links

Commons : Elyes Fakhfakh  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f Biographie de Elyes Fakhfakh. TAP , January 20, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  2. ↑ a b Parliament in Tunis expresses confidence in the new government. In: Deutsche Welle . February 27, 2020, accessed July 15, 2020.
  3. ↑ a b Tunisia's Prime Minister Fakhfakh offers to resign after the corruption affair. In: The Standard . July 15, 2020, accessed July 15, 2020.
  4. ↑ Biography of M. Elyès Fakhfakh, ministre des Finances. In: Babnet.net. December 19, 2012, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  5. ↑ Elyes Fakhfakh at-il attribué un marché public à sa propre société? In: Kapitalis.com. June 23, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  6. ^ Tunisia coalition under pressure over PM conflict of interest allegations. Reuters , June 30, 2020, accessed July 15, 2020.
  7. ↑ a b Elyes Fakhfakh annonce la cession de ses actions dans une société qui traite avec l'Etat. TAP, June 25, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  8. ^ Lilia Blaise: En Tunisie, un gouvernement d 'indépendants' pour sortir de la confusion politique. In: Le Monde . January 3, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  9. ↑ Biography d'Elyes Fakhfakh, candidat à la Primature. In: Businessnews.com.tn. January 20, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  10. ↑ Elyes Fakhfakh, nouveau ministre des finances. In: Leconomistemaghrebin.com. December 20, 2012, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  11. ^ Tunisie, Justice: Nidaa Tounes reprend son siège octroyé à Ettakatol à Kasserine suite à une décision du Tribunal Administratif. ( Memento from December 25, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) In: Tunivisions.net. November 7, 2014 (French).
  12. ↑ Everything at the beginning in Tunisia. In: Deutsche Welle. January 21, 2020, accessed July 15, 2020.
  13. ^ Officiel: La composition du gouvernement Fakhfakh. In: Kapitalis.com. February 19, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  14. ↑ Conflit d'intérêts: Elyes Fakhfakh décide de vendre ses actions , In: La Presse , June 22, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 I (French).
  15. ↑ a b Affaire Fakhfakh Gate: Les éclaircissements du groupement Soteme, Valis et Serpol , in: Kapitalis.com , July 12, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 (French).
  16. ↑ Frida Dahmani: Tunisie: Elyes Fakhfakh mis en cause pour conflit d'intérêts , in: Jeune Afrique , July 1, 2020, accessed on July 15, 2020 (French).
  17. ↑ Mohamed Khalil Jelassi: Session exceptionnelle du Conseil de la Choura: Ennahdha veut la tête d'Elyès Fakhfakh! , in: La Presse , July 13, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 (French).
  18. ↑ La motion de censure contre Elyes Fakhfakh déposée au bureau de l'Assemblée avec 105 voix , in: Kapitalis.com , July 15, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 (French).
  19. ↑ Kais Saied: “Je n'accepterai aucune concertation avec qui que ce soit tant que le chef du gouvernement actuel exerce toutes ses prérogatives” in: La Presse , July 13, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 (French).
  20. ↑ Tunisie: démission du premier ministre Elyes Fakhfakh, après un bras de fer avec le parti islamo-conservateur Ennahda , in: Le Monde , July 15, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020 (French).
  21. ↑ Tunisia's Prime Minister Fakhfakh resigns , Deutsche Welle , July 15, 2020, accessed on July 16, 2020.
personal data
SURNAME Fakhfakh, Elyes
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Tunisian politician
DATE OF BIRTH 1972
PLACE OF BIRTH Tunis