Tahar Ben Ammar: A Visionary Leader for a Modern Tunisia
Every year on May 8th, I am reminded of my father, Tahar Ben Ammar, who passed away on the same fateful day in 1985 and was buried two days later on May 10th. It was the same Tahar Ben Ammar who, as the Prime Minister of Tunisia under French protectorate, led the delegation that negotiated independence and signed the protocol that resulted from it on March 20, 1956. After considering it more decent not to monopolize the spotlight for too long, he submitted his resignation to the monarch on April 9th. Habib Bourguiba succeeded him:
"The Tunisian government has submitted its resignation to His Highness today. Formed the day after Tunisia's accession to internal autonomy, this government has had the honor of recognizing Tunisia's complete independence, organizing elections to the Constituent Assembly, and presiding over the installation of the Assembly. Its mission to secure Tunisia's sovereignty was thus fulfilled; and it was its duty, out of respect for democratic principles, to make way for those whom the people and the sovereign would entrust with the tasks dictated by the new circumstances.
Do I need to say how great my joy is to see, after the indescribable exaltation of our promotion to independence, Tunisia entering in fact into the exercise of democracy? The solemn installation of the Constituent National Assembly, in the grand hall of the Bardo Palace, amidst an emotion that united our entire country, materialized in my eyes a dream that had always been pursued and to which my own reason for living and that of all Tunisians was attached.
My greatest pride, thirty-five years later, of the day I led the second delegation to Paris in 1921 to demand a 'Destour' for Tunisia, is to have signed the successive protocols of autonomy and independence for my country and presided over the governments that laid the foundations for a free Tunisia.
(...) Under the auspicious circumstances that mark its present, our young Tunisia, I am certain, will know, through work and unity, bright tomorrows."
— Declaration of Tahar Ben Ammar on April 9, 1956.
Tahar Ben Ammar was the first member of his family to engage in politics, primarily to resist French colonization, which, like all those initiated in the 19th century, was characterized by a heavy occupation by colonizers who seized the best lands and resources of the country, engaging in large-scale predation at the expense of local populations.
From his high school years, he revealed a particular sensitivity to the injustices committed by the authorities of the Protectorate. His personal investment in politics was the logical consequence: in 1911 and 1912, at the age of twenty, he participated in the events of Jellaz and the Tramway, opposing the dominant forces.
At the same time, he traveled several times to France and Italy, interested in agricultural progress that he would later draw inspiration from to modernize his family's farm, while also benefiting the entire country through the institutional network of the Chamber of Agriculture, which he presided over for several years.
During the same period, each of his trips to France allowed him to expand his social circle, consisting of politicians, among others, so that, over the years, he could draw on it to defend Tunisia's interests, as he did during the Congress of Versailles in 1919, dedicated to the self-determination of peoples, where he presented the Tunisian question to President Woodrow Wilson, submitting to him a well-documented memo on Tunisia's claims on this subject. He also entrusted him with a letter from Emir Khaled expressing the same concerns on behalf of Algeria. Similarly, his relationships were useful when, in the 1950s, it was a matter of elaborating, patiently and intelligently, the strategy that would lead us to independence in a less painful way than in Indochina or Algeria.
It is difficult today to imagine the subtlety required after World War II to achieve decolonization without too many losses or upheavals: the troops from colonized countries had helped the Western allies in their final victory against the Axis powers, but France intended to maintain its empire, and the end of hostilities in the West meant an intensification of colonial pressure, as the inhabitants of Sétif in Algeria learned, victims of a mass massacre on the day of the Armistice.
For a decade, the aggression of the colonizers was felt in Cap Bon, Tunis, and elsewhere, through bloody repression and commissioned assassinations. The decolonization machine was launched, but to achieve it without too many victims, it was necessary to have statesmen who were both fine strategists and fine tacticians, all the more so since the upcoming decolonizations would require substantial aid, in the absence of real reparations for the harm suffered, to allow newly independent nations to integrate into the new global economy.
Tahar Ben Ammar was above all a man of the land and possessed all the virtues of those who are accustomed to fighting against unfavorable elements: tenacity, foresight, good sense, and wisdom. It was said of him that he was a born negotiator, never hesitating to approach his adversaries to try to neutralize them slightly. All these qualities were evident in all the areas he touched, and he was therefore the man who defended and even protected all the partisans of the struggle, acting both in the political sphere and among the resistance fighters on the ground, maintaining his privileged relationships with liberal French politicians who were committed to Tunisia's emancipation, but who themselves were subject to the instability of the Fourth Republic, to advance the agenda of Tunisian expectations without ever yielding to intimidation or attempts at manipulation by the opposing camp.
Thus, on March 3, during the negotiations for independence, he reaffirmed:
"We have prepared, on both sides, the Tunisian delegation and the French delegation, a project of Protocol. The French delegation considers Tunisia's independence as an object of negotiations, while the Tunisian delegation considers it as an indiscutable basis for the negotiations that will determine the modalities of interdependence. It is precisely in the freedom of the negotiations engaged and the agreements concluded by independent Tunisia that Franco-Tunisian interdependence will find its strength.
It is therefore a matter of lifting a misunderstanding. The Tunisian delegation is determined to open negotiations only in this framework. It specifies that it intends to give its adhesion to an independence organized in freedom and also in the solidary and active friendship of Tunisia and France.
If, as we wish and hope, the French delegation agrees with us on this way of regulating the future of our relations, the Tunisian negotiators are ready to continue in the best spirit the task entrusted to them. We will then report to Tunisia, which awaits with immense hope, the great news that will calm the population of our country.
In the hypothesis, which we refuse to believe possible, of the persistence of the misunderstanding, I would ask you, gentlemen, to consider that our mission is, to our great regret, terminated." — Intervention of Tahar Ben Ammar before the French delegation, to lift any ambiguity regarding the preliminary framework of the negotiation, since the French wanted to discuss the conditions of interdependence before coming to independence and refused to abrogate the Treaty of Bardo of 1881.
My father had a vision for a modern Tunisia, a developed nation, proud of its traditions, rooted in its identity, ready to face the challenges of the future. His engagement lasted for several decades, and he retired voluntarily, satisfied with what he had accomplished in the most disinterested service of his country, but not without receiving the promise from his successor to follow the advice he had dispensed during the handover:
"You are designated President of the Council, Prime Minister. You are at the head of the executive invested with legal and constitutional powers. That is not enough. In the exercise of power, you are also called upon to obey the moral laws whose respect will earn you the affection of others. The authority of the State cannot be exercised without morality, particularly in difficult times. Your duty is to gather around you the widest social strata and the most diverse political currents and to banish from your mind any rancor or desire for revenge. We must accept to unite fraternally in order to heal the wounded Tunisia. Fraternally, that is, by silencing absurd quarrels.
Tunisia must cease to be torn apart within itself and Tunisians divided among themselves, following conflicts sustained or suffered by our country, each naturally retaining their political options and supporting them freely, or even ardently. It is of the utmost importance that all hatred born of a more or less distant past disappear among Tunisians. Each one must also acknowledge the civic honesty of their neighbor. The re-established national cohesion will make the strength of all.
It is up to us to cherish and honor the memory of great men who have served Tunisia and led it towards sovereignty. Among them, Tahar Ben Ammar still figures today, a model of clairvoyance, good sense, and competence. We would like, in these troubled times where the covetousness of the powerful is exacerbated everywhere in the world, that there were more politicians of his stature and that they showed as much wisdom as he did.
A pious and virtuous thought for him on the occasion of the 41st anniversary of his death.
C.B.A."
