The statement below was released by the Socialist Alliance on January 29.
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The Socialist Alliance applauds the courage and tenacity of the Tunisian people, whose protests for democracy and economic and social justice have ended the 23-year rule of dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
The Tunisian revolution has inspired ordinary people across the Arab world. Protests have broken out in Algeria, Jordan, Yemen and — most dramatically — against the United States-backed dictatorship in Egypt.
The Tunisian people achieved the overthrow of Ben Ali without any outside help. But the regime was supported by Western powers, in particular France and the US, right until the moment Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia.
In Egypt, hundreds of thousands of people are in the streets standing up to the violence of the security forces of Hosni Mubarak, dictator since 1981.
More than 40 million Egyptians live on less than US$2 a day and more than 1 million children live on the street. Egypt’s people are denied free elections and suffer severe repression for any expression of dissent.
The tragedy of the invasion of Iraq has shown the falsehood of Western claims that its role in the region is to bring about democratic regime change.
The people of Tunisia and Egypt are showing that democratic regime change will come from the people themselves.
The Egyptian and Tunisian uprisings are not just against Western-backed dictators. They are against an unjust global economic system based on the plunder of the resources of poor countries by Western corporations.
Ben Ali and Mubarak faithfully implemented the policies of institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. This has led to greater poverty, unemployment and lack of opportunity for ordinary people.
On December 17, the twin evils of poverty and dictatorship in Tunisia became too much for Mohammed Bouazizi. He suffered police brutality and had the fruit cart from which he eked out a living confiscated — a marginal living typical for many Tunisians.
His desperate response, burning himself to death in front of local government offices, catalysed a revolution.
After Ben Ali fled, Tunisians took out their anger on the mansions of his corrupt cronies and relatives.
Tunisian workers, from banks and insurance companies to airlines and the media, have literally thrown out managers who were close to the regime and have taken over the enterprises themselves.
The dictator has gone, but the interim government is largely made up of ministers who served under Ben Ali.
The Tunisian people are now calling for the resignation of all ministers linked with the previous regime. In provincial towns, the establishment of democratic councils based on participatory mass meetings is challenging the regime.
Western leaders, now pretending to be in favour of democracy in Tunisia, have demanded that the current interim government remain to oversee the transition to democracy.
The Socialist Alliance expresses its full solidarity with the Tunisian people’s demands for a new, representative government.
The Socialist Alliance calls for:
· No Western interference in Tunisia. The Tunisian people have shown that it is they, and not the Western empires, who know what democracy means.
· The West to stop propping up the Mubarak dictatorship in Egypt, the second-largest recipient of US military aid in the world (after Israel).
· An end to the Western military occupation of Iraq, and other Western military interference in region, including the occupation of Afghanistan and covert operations in Yemen and Somalia.