Mohamed Harmel

Mohamed Harmel (محمد حرمل) (November 1929 – 18 September 2011) was a Tunisian politician.

Between 1981 and 1993 he served as First Secretary of the Tunisian Communist Party, and in 2007 he became an honorary president of the Ettajdid Movement. He was a member of the country's Chamber of Advisors (Upper legislative assembly) from 2008 till its dissolution in March 2011.

Life

Early years

Born into an artisan "chaouchi" Tunis family, During this period he engaged politically with the Tunisian Communist Party, and distributed leaflets in support of Tunisian independence.

He was arrested in September 1949 following a street demonstration organised by the "Tunisian Committee for Liberty and Peace", Recalling these experiences much later in his life, Hamel explained that he had been "processed through the military court" and "could have been given a death sentence", adding that "the mood often became heated between Destorian and Communists during [their] imprisonment at Téboursouk, and later, each time they encountered each other while leafleting in the streets.

Party office In May 1956, at the fifth congress of the Tunisian Communist Party, he was elected to the party politburo and secretariat. After a few seconds of reflection Bourguiba replied, in magisterial terms, that the ban should be lifted at once. Later on the same day the ban on the Tunisian Communist Party was lifted. He was elected and served as a deputy in the legislative assembly between 1994 and 1999. At one stage he became President of the Commission for Parliamentary Immunity, in the process becoming the first opposition deputy to become president of a commission. This was a reference to the coming to power as president on that date of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. For the 2004 presidential election Mohamed Harmel was again debarred from standing on account of his age. He was 75. He did participate in that year's elections for the legislature, but failed to be re-elected despite his name appearing at the top of the Ettajdid party list for the Tunis electoral district. Following this disappointing result the Ettajdid national executive issued a communiqué on 12 December lamenting the "exclusion" of their party general secretary from the National Assembly as damaging to the pluralism in the chamber. According to the historian Larbi Chouikha this communiqué contained echoes of the 1990s when the Communist Party was advocating "consensual democracy" combined with power.

Final years Mohamed Harmel stood down as Ettajdid Party Secretary at the party conference of 30 July 2007: he was succeeded by Ahmed Brahim. He was immediately proclaimed, and unanimously elected, Honorary Party President, which was a post expressly created to mark the movement's appreciation of the historic scope of his political contributions. having in effect already let it be known that he would not be standing for re-election.

Elsewhere, however, there are signs that he was not entirely relaxed about losing power and influence within the movement. Directly before the congress of July 2007 he prepared two pieces for the party newspaper, Attariq Al Jadid. These were headed, "In all candour" in the Arab language section and "Question mark" in the francophone section. They were not included in the special Party Congress edition of the paper, and in an open letter to readers published in August 2008 Harmel explained why he had not written for the paper again, because of management conditions imposed in respect of his contributions.

In 2007 he insisted in an interview that he had laid down all control organisational responsibility of his own will, also explaining that the 2007 party congress had never specified the nature of his role as Honorary Party President, which some had been content to leave as a fudge in a way that was less than comradely and that shocked him. But he insisted that he was nevertheless not riled by the situation. The choices had been his own, made with a good conscience, and it was "normal" that others would take over.

Mohamed Harmel died on 18 September 2011. Paying tribute, his successor Ahmed Brahim declared that Tunisia had lost a great patriot and great fighter in the service of the people, for democracy and progress.