Fouad Mebazaa, the former president of the lower house of parliament, was sworn in as chief of state on Saturday. He says he asked the premier to form a "national unity government in the country's best interests."
Mebazaa said in his first televised address that all political parties including the opposition will be consulted "without exception nor exclusion."
The shock to the wider Arab world is all the more significant because President Ali was not the worst sort of dictator:
Ben Ali's downfall sent a potentially frightening message to autocratic leaders across the Arab world, especially because he did not seem especially vulnerable until very recently.
He managed the economy of his small country of 10 million better than many other Middle Eastern nations grappling with calcified economies and booming young populations. He turned Tunisia into a beach haven for European tourists, helping create an area of stability in volatile North Africa. There was a lack of civil rights and little or no freedom of speech, but a better quality of life for many than in neighboring countries such as Algeria and Libya.
Ben Ali won frequent praise from abroad for presiding over reforms to make the economy more competitive and attract business. Growth last year was at 3.1 percent.
Unemployment, however, was officially 14 percent but actually far higher — 52 percent — among the young. Despair among job-seeking young graduates was palpable.
The riots started after an educated but jobless 26-year-old committed suicide in mid-December when police confiscated the fruits and vegetables he was selling without a permit. His desperate act hit a nerve, sparked copycat suicides and focused generalized anger against the regime into a widespread, outright revolt.
President Barack Obama said he applauded the courage and dignity of protesting Tunisians, and urged all parties to keep calm and avoid violence.
Arabs across the region celebrated news of the Tunisian uprising on Twitter, Facebook and blogs. Thousands of tweets congratulating the Tunisian people flooded the Internet, and many people changed their profile pictures to Tunisian flags.
Lacking other ways to protest or affect a government that ruled over them rather than in their name and with their consent, the protests escalated to an uprising.
The shock is for the ruling classes of these other autocracies, of course. For many living under them, the events of the last month offer hope:
"Now the bell is ringing and it should be a reminder to other leaders that people are fed up," said political analyst Labib Kamhawi in Jordan, where more than 5,000 people joined rallies on Friday to protest rising prices and demand the prime minister's ouster.
"They need political freedoms and serious economic reforms, that there must be an end to corruption and nepotism," he added.
Dozens of demonstrators rallied outside the Tunisian embassies Saturday in Cairo and Amman, Jordan.
Meanwhile, thousands of messages congratulating the Tunisian people flooded the Internet on Twitter, Facebook and blogs, and many people replaced their profile pictures with red Tunisian flags.
Remember, however, that we have the hope of a happy ending in Tunisia because Ali was not the worst sort of dictator, no order to kill as many protesters as necessary to restore order was issued. So there was no Tunis Square slaughter to restore a faux calm based on restoring the balance of fear in the government's favor.
Other dissidents may learn that they can topple their corrupt, non-democratic rulers, too.
But their corrupt rulers may have learned that the proper response to stirrings of uprising must be met with the means of their more brutal fellow autocrats (Iran--though not Arab--and Syria come to mind). And if it comes to a showdown, mass murder could be the only answer to the momentum of a protest that reaches mass uprising and riots.
Then the only question is whether the security forces stand with the regime and obey the orders to kill everyone they see on the streets.
Finally, this is another rebuke to those over here, who because of their blind hatred of George W. Bush and opposition to the Iraq War, insisted that Arabs just aren't ready for democracy and don't really deserve it. The rebuke comes from both sides of the equation. Rulers in the Moslem Middle East hold sham elections to legitimize their rule. Why bother if elections aren't wanted? And dissidents want real elections to reflect the will of the people. Why press for free voting if they don't really want them? Tunisia will have new elections. Let's see if they are real or sham. Let's use our influence to work for real elections.
Never forget, however, that as much as elections are the proxy indicator for freedom, elections--even free elections--are not enough to have freedom. Even as our president has commended the protesters for rising up to overthrow a dictator, we must help Tunisia have free elections and establish rule of law. The latter is more crucial to ensuring freedom, even if it is not as easily grasped as seeing purple fingers emerging from voting booths. Free elections are certainly crucial and necessary, but they are not the last step in achieving freedom.
The democracy project in the Middle East should not be dead, despite the inconvenient legacy of being a George W. Bush goal. Liberals who support President Obama should be the first to embrace this project given their self-proclaimed status of "progressives" who purport to favor the people over the powerful.
America needs to stay engaged in Iraq as Iraqis take the steps beyond free elections to entrench rule of law. We need to step in to help Tunisia hold free elections and then move beyond those votes to entrench rule of law. We at least shouldn't have the stumbling block of violent Sadrists, al Qaeda, and former regime elements trying to bomb their way back to power. And we should strengthen institutions that promote rule of law in the rest of the Middle East and reach out to peaceful dissidents who seek rule of law and free elections.
Do this and autocrats will have real reason to fear change, and dissidents will have a real basis for hope. One democracy in the Moslem Middle East (Iraq) could be written off as a fluke. A second (in Tunisia) could be a trend. A third could signal the beginning of a new era. Knuckle-dragging conservative though I am, I happen to believe Arabs deserve a better future, want a better future, and--with the support of those who already made that journey--can learn to handle it and build a better future on that foundation.
Let's make this something to be proud of.
UPDATE: Why it will take more than the departure of Ali just to get to the first step of free and fair elections:
We feel overwhelming happiness and hope,” says Naziha Rejiba, a long-time human rights activists and independent journalist in Tunisia reached by phone. “But there are also questions about the future. The people of Tunisia brought down a dictator. But now we must work to build a democratic society in Tunisia.”
Corrupt, powerful system remains in placeThe corrupt and powerful system Ben Ali built did not disappear when his jet left Tunis, making the goal of establishing democracy a lofty one.
There is hope. But much must change.
UPDATE: On the chances of democracy in Tunisia. Right now, all we can say is they have hope. Which is an amazing change from a month ago. Much can go wrong between hope and change, of course. We should help them overcome all the forces that will work to wreck true change to achieve real democracy.
