Tyrants alarmed by Tunisian unrest

TUNISIA’S political earthquake has shattered the cosy world of entrenched Arab rulers and destroyed the image of their military-backed regimes as immune to popular discontent and grievances.

From Atlantic coast to Gulf shores, live images on Arab satellite channels of a popular uprising unseating President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali after 25 years in power must have rattled Arab leaders, many with similarly repressive records.

Analysts, opposition figures and ordinary people say the Tunisian revolt may prove contagious. Like Tunisians, many Arabs are frustrated by soaring prices, poverty, high unemployment and systems of rule that ignore their voices.

These leaders, they say, can no longer just ignore the plight of their poor or rely on subduing their restive populations with brute force without retribution.

“The developments in Tunisia are like an earthquake. Arab rulers will try to loosen up their regimes by giving some freedom, providing jobs and education and other things. Then they will try to become repressive again,” says Mohammed al-Qahtani, a Saudi opposition activist based in Riyadh.

“The question will be if people have learned their lessons and will let them get away it.”

Ordinary Arabs may be less willing now to accept their governments’ old political tactics. Stunned by TV footage from Tunis, many are wondering if the same could happen at home.

“Tyrants don’t last forever. This is a clear message to every dictatorial regime that rules by iron and fire,” said a commentator on a discussion forum, UAE Hewar.

“The Tunisians are real men. They took matters into their own hands and had the courage to control their own fate and said ‘no’ to oppression,” said a 55-year-old Egyptian veteran of the 1973 war with Israel.

“The Egyptian people suffer just like the Tunisians, and this encourages all Egyptians to do the same.”

Social networking sites in the region have lit up with calls for action. Twitter and Facebook have changed the rules for Arab governments who could once spoon-feed news to their people.

“People cannot be bought forever with economic goodies in an age of information flowing freely. Today, people can make comparisons,” said Jasim Husain, an opposition member of Bahrain’s parliament.

In Egypt, where President Hosni Mubarak has been in power for three decades, one Facebook page was entitled “Project to prepare a plane for each president” and several pages called on the 82-year-old leader to start packing his bags.

“Enough is enough. We are fed up and we will not let our country slip from our hands any longer,” said one Facebook user.

But defusing popular fury over surging prices or political repression involves tough choices for Arab states alarmed at the overthrow of their Tunisian counterpart.

Plans in many Arab states to phase out food and other subsidies may be delayed, or even shelved, in a concession to anger about surging prices in a region that imports much of what it eats.

This will add to burgeoning deficits that worry foreign investors who buy the region’s debt, and may undermine reforms aimed at generating growth and jobs. But such long-term worries are likely to be given short shrift.

“These are not long-term thinkers and strategists. We are talking about authoritarian leaders who have fundamentally one concern — how to stay in power and manage the opposition,” said Hamid.

But some officials have taken note, including in Algeria.

“A wise man must take what happened in Tunisia as a lesson. The best protection and the best legitimacy are always the ones provided by the people,” Abdelaziz Belkhadem, leader of the Algerian president’s party, wrote in Algeria’s El Khabar daily.