Once again Tunisians awoke to the news of a political murder and this time was unusually symbolic, occurring on July 25, the 65th anniversary of the Tunisian Republic. Mohamed Brahmi, an opposition figure and one of the founding members of the Constituent Assembly was shot dead by unidentified gunmen, less than six months after his colleague Chokri Belaid was gunned down in a similar manner.

Once again Tunisians awoke to the news of a political murder and this time was unusually symbolic, occurring on July 25, the 65th anniversary of the Tunisian Republic. Mohamed Brahmi, an opposition figure and one of the founding members of the Constituent Assembly was shot dead by unidentified gunmen, less than six months after his colleague Chokri Belaid was gunned down in a similar manner.

Brahmi, former Secretary General of the People’s Movement said goodbye to his wife and five children as he did every morning and was met with twelve bullets, which ravaged his body from head to the toe.

Two of Brahmi’s young children were eyewitnesses to the assasination and described two men riding a motorcycle, wearing black clothes; one wore a red hat while the second wore gray hat. “The two assassins escaped after they shot my father dead,” Brahmi’s daughter said.  

A Tunisian morning starts with bloodshed

In Mahmoud al-Matiri Hospital in Aryana (north of the capital), Brahmi was pronounced dead in the hospital’s lobby, where some members of the Constituent Assembly came to see Brahmi for the last time. 

Hundreds of citizens and dozens of politicians expressed shock in reaction to the shooting. Hassine al-Abbassi, the Secretary General of the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT) said the country was heading towards the unknown and drifting towards a bloodbath.

A campaign launched by civil society activists called for flying the national flag everywhere as an expression of Tunisian citizens’ adherence to the republic and its values. Leading member of the Ennahda Movement and an MP in the Constituent Assembly urged people not to fly it over their houses in order to avoid sedition. Nevertheeless, the Tunisian flag flew at half mast to grieve the second victim of political violence since the revolution in 2011, which toppled long-time dictator Ben Ali.

MP Hisham Hosni, Brahmi’s comrade in the Popular Front, said “Any person who antagonizes the Ennahda Movement will be killed with a bullet.” 

Mohammed Brahmi was a pan-Arab and Nasserite symbol in Tunisia (a relative of the late Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser). His stances were decisive and he advocated on behalf of the poor. He was also committed to the unity of the nation and Arab untiy and he supported the recent uprising in Egypt, believing that al-Sisi sided with the will of the people and did not stage a coup.

The assassination of Brahmi came after about a week of his colleague’s remarks in the Constituent Assembly, and the statement made by the head of the Ennahda bloc Sahbi Atiq in which he said: “Whoever insults the legitimacy will be crushed in the streets of Tunisia.”  Some mourning Mohamed Brahmi believe he may have insulted the legitimacy and thus paid with his blood.

Martyrs are born in Sidi Bouzid

Mohammed Brahmi was born in Sidi Bouzid on May 15, 1955, a stronghold of the 2011 revolution and the city of martyrs—Mohamed Bouazizi, the fruit seller who set himself on fire and sparked the revolution was also from Sidi Bouzid.  Brahimi represented this afflicted state in the Constituent Assembly.

He later on joined the Higher Institute for Accountancy and received his professorship in accounting in 1982.             

Brahmi had a passion for politics since he was very young. He was one of the members of a generation who appreciated the pan-Arab ideas of the late Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel Nasser. He was passionate about pan-Arabism and he was assassinated in the midst of the celebrations of Gamal Abdel Nasser revolution in Egypt (July 23).

At university, Brahmi joined what was then called the “Arab Progressive Unionist Students” and he became one of its activists until he formed, together with his colleagues in 2005, the Nasserite Unionist Movement.  It was a banned movement and its members operated in secret.  After the revolution, Brahmi founded the People’s Movement but he resigned from the General Secretariat some days ago to establish the popular stream, an ally of the Popular Front.

Brahmi was an advocate of social demands, an anti-Ali al-Areed government, and a fierce opponent of the Ennahda movement because he considered it a movement, which encouraged violence and chaos to perpetuate its rule. He was publicly saying that Ennahda Movement believed neither in dialogue nor in democracy and that the actual party ruling Tunisia is the Shura Council of the Ennahda Movement and not the Constituent Assembly.

The finger pointed in Ennahda’s direction

“If Ennahda does not achieve its objectives it will drive the country into violence,” ironically were the last words uttered by Mohamed Brahmi to the public.

A few hours after the assassination, Ennahda leader Rachid Ghannouchi came out of his silence, contrary to what he did when Chokri Beleid was assassinated and said that Brahmi’s murder was a heinous crime and those who stood behind it were Tunisia’s enemies and the enemies of democracy.

Ghannouchi stressed that the Ennahda Movement was being accused of assassinating Belaid but investigations have already proven the movement’s innocence. “There are some people who want to accuse us of a new murder charge,” Ghannouchi said.

Ghannouchi also stressed that the government was not benefiting from this assassination. A few hours before the assassination, the government announced that it was able to identify the assassin of Belaid and that it would announce all the details within days. 

Dissolving the government and the Constituent Assembly

The Popular Front, to which Brahmi belonged, as well as the Union for Tunisia and most of the existing parties outside the government called for dissolving the Constituent Assembly,  the government and the presidency of the republic, which the assembly has produced.

Hamma Hammami, the spokesman for the Popular Front called Tunisians toward bringing “peaceful civil disobedience to bring down the government”. Influential centrist parties such as the Nidaa Tounes, al-Masar and al-Joumhouri  agreed with the stance of the front on bringing  down the government and forming a government of national salvation.

Civil organizations, personalities and unions called for the resignation of the President of the Republic and the government as well as the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly. They also called for the return to the situation, which has prevailed before the elections of the Constituent Assembly and the activation of the 1959 Constitution. One day after the assassination of Brahmi, General of the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT) called for a general strike. Sami al-Tahiri, the Assistant Secretary-General of the Union, said “This call is the least we can do for the martyr. It is also in defense of the Tunisians who were killed and those who are waiting for their turn to martyrdom.”

The aim of the assassination, claimed Brahmi’s colleague, Professor Khaled al-Kraishi was easily summed up: “They wanted to silence any person who says ‘no’ in a time when everybody is saying ‘yes’.”