Lawmakers in the Tunisian parliament have boycotted a plenary session that was initially devoted to the discussion of a motion introduced by the opposition Free Constitutional Party (PDL) bloc.
The motion was earlier presented by PDL Head Abir Moussa, asking the parliament to issue a statement condemning the laundering of terrorism and calling on the government to dry up its sources of financing.
The session could not be held for lack of quorum, as only 48 deputies were present.
Ennahda representatives have called for amending Article 141 of the parliament’s bylaw to only allow at least parties with one-third of the parliamentary seats present a motion.
According to Head of Ennahda Movement parliamentary bloc Imed Khmiri, this step has ended the “absurdity” of misusing motions.
In press statements, Khmiri accused Moussa of misusing the article.
She has intended throughout her parliamentary term to disrupt the plenary sessions with regulations that have nothing to do with the economic and social priorities for Tunisians, he said in press statements.
The parliament has only approved a single motion on Palestine throughout its term from 2014 till 2019, he stressed.
In her response to the lack of quorum, Moussa said it is a turning point in Tunisia’s history.
She accused the ruling coalition and the opposition democratic bloc of avoiding the discussion of a significant matter, threatening to escalate and widen the circle of protest movements.
Her bloc’s motion has called on the government to take measures to dissolve political and association organizations that support violence, terrorist ideology, and extremist takfirist rhetoric.
It also urged the Central Bank of Tunisia (BCT) to tighten control over the external funding sources of these associations and uncover foreign funding networks and refer them to the Tunisian judiciary.
It justified the introduction of the motion to the increasing number of terrorist operations, the spread of extremist ideology, and the multiple platforms for spreading inciting and takfiri rhetoric through active associations across the world.
The motion stressed that there are deputies who defend perpetrators of terrorist operations and have been seeking to launder these operations and justify their perpetration by all means, in addition to “the risks of all practices aimed at providing a political and popular incubator for terrorism”.
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