Hédi Baccouche

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Hédi Baccouche (2013)

Hédi Baccouche ( Arabic الهادي البكوش al-Hadi al-Bakkush , DMG al-Hādī al-Bakkūš ; * January 15, 1930 in Hammam Sousse near Sousse ; † January 21, 2020 ) was a Tunisian politician and Prime Minister of Tunisia.

While still at school at a grammar school in Sousse, Baccouche joined Habib Bourguiba's neo-Destur party at the age of 16 and founded a cell of this movement there in 1950, which was directed against French colonial rule in Tunisia, which is why he was imprisoned by the colonial power in 1952 has been. He then studied political science at the Sorbonne in Paris and became vice-chairman of the Neo-Destur students in Europe. After graduating from college, Baccouche returned and became deputy director of the Neo-Destur party. In the Republic of Tunisia, which has been independent since 1956, he became governor of Bizerte , Sfax and Gabès under President Habib Bourguiba and worked for Ahmed Ben Salah , the state secretary for planning and finance and the strong man of the Tunisian government in the 1960s. After his fall in 1969 and the abandonment of his socialist economic program, Baccouche managed to stay in the closest circle of power and in 1971 became an advisor to Prime Minister Hédi Nouira .

In 1979 Baccouche became consul general in Lyon and in 1981/82 was ambassador to Switzerland , to the Holy See and later to Algeria. In 1984 he returned to Tunisia as managing director of the ruling Neo-Destur party and in 1987 became Minister of Social Affairs. On November 7, 1987, he succeeded Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali , who had successfully replaced Habib Bourguiba as President in a bloodless coup, the new Prime Minister. At the same time, Baccouche became the new general secretary of the newly formed ruling party Rassemblement constitutionnel démocratique (RCD), which was actually ruled by the president . On September 27, 1989, Ben Ali replaced him with Hamed Karoui in both offices, as Baccouche publicly criticized the government program and, from the point of view of President Ben Ali, had developed too much claim to power of his own. Baccouche was still a member of the Central Committee of the RCD, whose rule was ended in the revolution in Tunisia 2010/2011 , but remained withdrawn from the public. After the revolution, Baccouche joined the public debate on the state of the country, calling for the restoration of state order and stability and discussing his own role in the 1987 coup with exiled former President Ben Ali.

He was one of the 138 signatories of the open letter a common word between us and you ( english A Common Word Between Us and You ), the personalities of Islam to "leaders of Christian churches everywhere" sent (13 th October 2007).

On May 28, 2005 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Sousse .

He died on January 21, 2020 at the age of 90.

Publications

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Décès de l'ancien, Premier ministre tunisien Hédi Baccouche. In: Kapitalis. Retrieved January 21, 2020 (French).
  2. ^ Hédi Baccouche in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely accessible).
  3. ^ Clement Henry Moore: Tunisia Since Independence. The Dynamics of one-party government. University of California Press, Berkeley 1965, pp. 83-88 ; Michael Willis: Politics and Power in the Maghreb. Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco from Independence to the Arab Spring. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, pp. 232 f. .
  4. ^ A b Frida Dahmani: Hédi Baccouche: “La restauration de l'État est une impérieuse nécessité” in Tunisie. In: Jeune Afrique , December 24, 2013.
  5. ↑ Christopher Alexander: Authoritarianism and Civil Society in Tunisia. Back from the Democratic Brink. In: Middle East Report. Vol. 27, 1997, No. 205 (end note 6).
  6. ^ Tunisie-Politique: La réponse de Zine Ben Ali à Hédi Baccouche. In: Jeune Afrique , April 22, 2014.
  7. ↑ A common word between us and you. Summarized short form. In: acommonword.com (PDF; 186 kB).
  8. ^ Communication ( Memento of June 13, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) on the University of Sousse website, 2005 (French).
personal data
SURNAME Baccouche, Hédi
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Al-Hadi Al-Bakkoush
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Tunisian politician and diplomat
DATE OF BIRTH January 15, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Sousse
DATE OF DEATH January 21, 2020