Bouazizi Mohamed dreamed of buying a van and expand the business, but never become a national hero. He was, simply, a fruit vendor. From a very young, his life had been that: buy fruit and vegetables on a cart and drag them to the main square in Sidi Bouzid, a lost city in the map of Tunisia. Fate chose, however, and on December 17, desperate, frustrated, no horizon, threw up a can of gasoline and set himself on fire.So it all started. Thus came the popular revolt that has toppled the dictatorship of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali and suddenly changed the political map of Tunisia, in less than a month of demonstrations and exciting events. And who knows but also the future of another country. It has not been without costs.
Bouazizi Mohamed was burnt to death in hospital of Sfax, Jan. 4, and his family still has not received special assistance, only the consolation of seeing that his death was not in vain. Mohamed lived in Hainur neighborhood where houses are still mud and asphalt gradually fades from wasteland full of garbage bags.
The house of Mohamed, who lost his father at age three, is a plant with three small bedrooms, bathroom and kitchen. And there are eight people. With him were nine. "He was very calm and smiling he liked to be a salesman. Is devoted to it from 10 years to feed the family. Studied and worked at the same time, but never finished high school.
He contributed money to his sister Leila could study in college, in Monastir. No one else has a job in the family. At night bought the goods sold the next day. Some days gained 10 or 15 dinars [eight euros]. Often less, "says Samia, sister of 19 years. Bouazizi family as poor as rich in good manners, does not have to invite to a tea.
Mohamed, who left a debt of 150 euros, money that used in purchase the latest merchandise, had two brothers-Salem, 30, and Leila, 24 - and four brothers. His mother, Manubia, 55, had four more children with Ammar: Samia, 19, Basma, 16 , Karim, 14, and the small Ziad, 8. They all share the house.
Mohamed had left school at 19 years and applied for membership in the Army, but was rejected. Many times the police robbed gender. Other it spilled on the floor and had to run away. Nothing strange in rural Tunisia, accustomed to the rampant police corruption, the requirement of kickbacks, abuse of power, the arrogance of the players and causing fear among 40,000 residents of the city.
A day of Ramadan, last summer, once again threw the cart and suffered a nervous breakdown. We had to take him to hospital. "I never suspected that this could happen," says Samia. Mohamed always smiling . He seemed happy. "At 8:30 on December 17 he left home. As usual. The police asked for money to enable it to continue selling, but he refused to give, as usual.
He tried to wrest the balance. And Feida, a municipal official , slapped him, "says the student, high like all the others, underlining the name of that woman. A fact, the smack, which can not be neglected, because in conservative Arab societies, being humiliated by a woman is a terrible insult to a man.
"Two policemen hit the legs," he continues Samia. "No one helped. Feida stepfather Mohamed insulted when he went to retrieve their goods to the City, and meet again with the official, who slammed the door. Mohamed said he would complain to the Government Palace, and the woman mocked him.
Who would do if a nobody. left the building, bought a can of gasoline of five liters and burnt alive in front of two policemen. I think I came to think that he had no hope. " Bouazizi Mohamed died of burns on 4 January, at age 26, a week after President Ben Ali come to visit the hospital in Sfax -110 miles east of Sidi Bouzid, and portray his left side.
A dead body, a mummy completely bandaged. Bouazizi ignored the will that bequeathed to Tunisia and other Arab countries. A huge explosion, a political upheaval that Tunisia has been turned upside down and unleashed a wave of suicides to the Bonze in the Maghreb and other Muslim countries.
He was addicted body and soul to his relatives who did not even like the hobby is all the rage in any Arab country. "I do not like football," says Ramzi, a cousin of the deceased, which was considered a martyr of the country. "He was intelligent, and sometimes I read the Arabic cult that I did not understand," said Ramzi.
But he had no higher education. "We were very surprised when we read that a degree in Computer Science," said Asma, a neighbor of Hainur. "If you study some English, French, German and computer science, but on their own," agrees Samia. "We do not have money to buy food. No government has called us, no one in the municipality.
There is no justice, someone has to help us," Samia said quietly, trying to console: "After the death of Mohammed seems likely extend freedom. Thanks to him, many people smile a little more each day because the dictator is gone. " Sidi Bouzid was a city conducive to an outbreak of this magnitude.
But there are many more so in Tunisia. Since there are tens of thousands of desperate bouazizis. Azmouni Attia, a leader in the city's opposition Democratic Progressive Party, said: "In Sidi Bouzid, farmers were already demanding that transportation problems were fixed and access to agricultural fields and some roads are asphalted.
There were also demonstrations in front the dairy because it had delayed payment of wages. The protests came from afar, but were crushed by the police. constantly spoke of repression, but the fear was atrocious. The Constitutional Democratic Grouping (CRD), the party of Ben Ali, became part of the police apparatus.
Those who complained were reported. " "Just knowing the incident," he continues, "people made a sit in front of the regional government building. I went to the hospital and only see his face burned. Breathing really bad." The regime still had breath and no one suspected what would happen less than a month later.
From the very day that Mohamed blew himself up, the police broke up any attempt to protest in Sidi Bouzid. But it was late. Within hours, thousands of Tunisians were raised against the Government in Kasrine and Gafsa, capital of a mining area in 2008 experienced serious unrest. Demonstrations were banned, but the hated dictatorship did not want to keep the crowd out into the streets when Israel launched the war against Gaza in December of that year.
"The protesters took advantage they could yell to make puns in which inveighed against the RCD," says Attia. The oil slick spread in a very short time to Thala, Douz, Tozeur ... But the capital still remained calm. And Ben Ali still felt safe when he visited on 28 December, Bouazizi bedridden.
Meanwhile, the Tunisians were delivered to the Internet and Facebook, and often censored, once long ago, for five months, to call events. No Internet, no Facebook and without Al Jazeera, the revolution would have been impossible, everyone agrees. Chamkhi Fathi, a geography professor and member of the Tunisian League for Human Rights, elaborates on the origin of the rebellion.
"It's a social and democratic revolution. It is democratic because there are claims relating to political freedoms and social and economic demands for labor there. There is an accumulation of facts for 23 years, which adds the global crisis of 2008. The scheme always said that Tunisia did not affect him and that soon everything would return to normal.
But Tunisia was seriously affected. In addition, other elements that are not material. I was very widespread feeling of humiliation and injustice. As everyday life would making it more difficult, people observed the opulence of the first family lived. It was insulting, especially, the cavalier attitude of Ben Ali.
I watched who was stealing and I also asked charity. Were watching television and received a slap. The revolt is born of frustration. Although it had not happened at that time, would have ended up happening. "The brazenness of the despot and his entourage, the family Trabelsi, maiden name Leila Ben Ali, the hairdresser with whom the president married his second wife, and families Mabrouk and Zarrouk-reaching unbearable levels.
looted national treasures, they seized fraudulent companies, telephony concessions in department stores, auto dealers, airlines, radio channels and television stations, banks ... On 11 January, the government began to show signs of nervousness when Ben Ali ousted Interior Minister Rafik Belhaj Kacem, and ordered the closure of universities and schools.
It is not allowed that people form groups of more than three or four people, and you could not stop in the street. It was by all means, as always, that the revolt not installed in the capital. Because that is too big. But in vain. The next day in the capital and suburbs, home to around two of the eleven million Tunisians, the revolution ceased to be a thing of ragged, peasants and workers impoverished further by the global crisis of 2008.
She was joined by men and women from all walks of life, lawyers, bloggers, artists, architects, intellectuals and elites housewives, students and rappers. As he sang: "Mr. President, your people are dead." He was arrested and beaten at the police station. The middle classes and many of the wealthy, college-educated graduates in the Paris Sorbonne, also stood up to demand political and civil liberties, and the establishment of a democratic regime.
Because in Tunisia, where no shortage of people with academic education, the education system was a priority for the Founding Father Habib Bourguiba, who ruled the country for three decades, since Tunisia gained independence from France in 1956. So was, at least in his early years in power, Ben Ali.
Illiteracy is as small as tiny has been the ability of the opposition, pursued without respite, to organize. So the Tunisian Intifada was a spontaneous, because any union or organization was subject to intense scrutiny of the regime. "I teach Spanish at the University and I know who are the students supposed to produce reports for the Government.
We should be very careful what we say in class," Kamel told Thursday Sahli. It was a country where the cookies are lorded, where uttering the name of Ben Ali without praise trucking mishaps or imprisonment. Many young people called him The singer and Eminem, for that artist's pose was reflected in several of its ubiquitous photographs.
Three days before his flight to Saudi Arabia, Avenue Habib Bourguiba of the capital looked like a large barracks. Dressed in civilian clothes, but the police, by the dozen in every corner, watching every movement. Since 12 January, the Tunisians did not sleep enough. In southern cities, the sharpshooters were raging since 17 December.
People fell under the bullets, but nothing deterred them from going out. They had lost their fear. In the capital, protests proliferated and slogans were repeated. Bread, water, and not Ben Ali "," Freedom is achieved with blood, "" Cop Killer "," Tunisia free "," Ben Ali, was "We do not want a president for life." "The interior minister is a terrorist", "Ben Ali, cowardly", "left a message Bouazizi, Trabelsi not want to." "We're not afraid." "Ben Ali, the murderer" screamed professors and teachers in the face of the police, on the campus of Al Manar.
The dictator was already desperate and on the ropes. The army chief, Rachid Ammar, had broached that day: "You're finished." But the president said that Ammar dismissed, but after the departure of the tyrant back in charge, yet he resisted. Two days earlier had promised it would create 300,000 jobs in two years and that security forces would not fire on civilians.
And the people he came the laughter. Appeared on day 13 in the evening to announce he would not run for reelection in 2014, and reduce the price of bread, milk and sugar. And the Tunisians reacted with sarcasm: "That raises the price of bread, but Ben Ali, to the gallows." Then came the fateful day, which will name squares and avenues, on 14 January.
That day, for the first time in 23 years, the magnets did not ask when you call to prayer, may Allah preserve the health of Ben Ali and his family. In the morning he had said the protesters, at nine o'clock, at the headquarters of the General Union of Workers, in a small square in the heart of the city.
Were a few hundred. The young businessman Yousef Farhat said: "O Ali Ben leaves or shoot. There is no other option." Marched on Avenue Habib Bourguiba, where he awaited a police cordon. The crowd began to sing the national anthem, which Ben Ali removed years ago a verse alluding to the revolution and combat.
Minutes later, police turned away. Walking quickly, they ran into another line of riot more fed, and an official with a megaphone in hand, tried to convince the mass to stop. In vain. The black-uniformed and gave way while hundreds of people were added to the group, arrived at the headquarters of the Ministry of Interior.
Were planted there for six hours. The excitement and momentum of the 10,000 protesters dominated everything. Many were hoarse. They carried pictures of Mohamed Ali Hammi and Habib Ashur, heroes of independence, and several also Mohamed Bouazizi. "If Ben Ali will not, we will blockade the country," he claimed.
"23 years of dictatorship do not fade with words." Newspapers broke to pull pieces of paper into the air. "Where is France, champion of human rights?" He asked. The atmosphere was festive. At 14.38 the party's over. A smoke canister hit the crowd. Everyone came out in terror. The disturbances spread through the center of the capital for hours.
But the regime was already dead. The soft revolution had ousted what some call "republican monarchy." No doubt a few hours ago and Ben Ali and his followers were the suitcases. The pilot Ben Mohamed Kilani Tunis Air refused to take off if Leila Trabelsi two brothers embarked on a flight that preceded that of Ben Ali, and became little more than a national hero.
At six o'clock in the afternoon, a plane took off from the international airport of Carthage. The champion of the struggle against Islam, thousands of party members in Nahda (Renaissance) were viciously persecuted, killed or went into exile since 20 years ago was banned fundamentalist movement, the repressor of any dissident communists and , who was stripped of his job, he escaped to Saudi Arabia.
After fleeing the president, the chaos was introduced in Tunisia. Turned into thugs, members of the presidential guard and the police tried to sow anarchy clean shot. The poorest also gave the looting of supermarkets and special fury of the mansions of Trabelsi and Ben Ali. The Army, adored by the people, took to restore order, while police vanished.
78 people have died so far in the revolution. Large posters with the figure of the dictator were burned and torn from their supports and the RCD was en route to the solution. And now there is talk of releasing political prisoners, of an independent commission to investigate corruption, political freedom, press freedom, after years of media abducted by the apparatus of power, democratic and constitutional reforms; of organization of elections for the disappearance of detainees who have never returned to their homes in the 404-enacted law to censor the Internet, "the need to restore calm to revive tourism and foreign investment vital for the country ..
. "It all began here at Sidi Bouzid, as might have started in any city in Tunisia. Now we seek a future for those who have died in this revolt," says Saad Kaddusi, a young teacher who, at night and heat of a fire , monitors in the company of a dozen men in a huge open field, so that Ben Ali's henchmen do not do from theirs.
Some drop their sticks to show their wounds or blood on clothing yet. The monument to the 7th of November, when the coup that lifted Ben Ali to power, has been desecrated with red paint. A most welcome desecration. Avenue Habib Bourguiba of Sidi Bouzid is full of painted with the new name with the neighbors want to baptize the street.
The 11 million Tunisians and much of the Arab world will never forget. Feida, the official, was wrong. Bouazizi Mohamed is already someone. -
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