01/17/2011

Tunisia's new leadership must recognize rights of Berbers

Dictator Ben Ali had indigenous people assimilated

[Translate to Englisch:] © K. Sido/GfbV

The new political leadership of Tunisia must finally acknowledge and respect the rights of Berbers, the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) stated. The appeal sent by the human rights organization on Monday to the interim president, Foued Mebazaa, called on the country to permit the indigenous population to establish their own associations, publish in their own language, and give their children Berber first names.

"With the fall of dictator Ben Ali, it is time for a new way of thinking," said the head of the Africa section at the STP, Ulrich Delius, in Göttingen. Ben Ali always denied the existence of the Berbers, or "Amazigh" as they call themselves. That is why to this day, there is no official information available on this minority. Amazigh are said to make up some ten percent of the ten million inhabitants of Tunisia. They live primarily in the southern part of the country, near the island of Djerba and near the Libyan and Algerian borders. Many Amazigh have emigrated to Europe as laborers or live in the metropolises of Tunisia.

The Amazigh were passed over when the Tunisian constitution was written in 1959, and Tunisia was declared to be a an Arab-Islamic nation. The fact that non-Arab Amazigh also live in Tunisia is ignored still today.

Even the secular opposition politicians called for Arabization of the country in their 1988 "Tunisian National Pact." Ben Ali advanced this Arabization under use of force. His "Child Protection Code," enacted in 1995, provides for education in accordance with Arab and Islamic values. Amazigh children are not allowed to have Berber first names, and the Berber language, culture and history are ignored not only in the school system but also in cultural life and in the media.