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Tunisia interim premier names caretaker cabinet

Arab World Materials 27 January 2014 01:46 (UTC +04:00)
Tunisia's interim prime minister, Mehdi Jomaa, named a caretaker government Sunday evening, after failing to reach a consensus over the key position of interior minister the day before, dpa reported.
Tunisia interim premier names caretaker cabinet

Tunisia's interim prime minister, Mehdi Jomaa, named a caretaker government Sunday evening, after failing to reach a consensus over the key position of interior minister the day before, dpa reported.

The interim cabinet will be made up of 21 ministers and seven state secretaries, all of them non-partisan experts.

Jomaa, an independent technocrat, was appointed last month after the governing Islamists agreed to step down to end a crisis threatening to upend the political transition triggered by the 2011 Arab Spring and the overthrow of authoritarian president Zine Abidine Ben Ali.

Caretaker president Moncef Marzouki had tasked Jomaa with appointing a series of non-partisan experts to lead an interim government to govern the country until democratic elections are held in 2014.

The current upheaval was triggered by the assassination of Mohamed Brahmi - one of the country's dissident leaders - in July, with many Tunisians blaming the ruling Islamist party Ennahda and its followers for the killing.

While Ennahda blamed radical Islamists for the attacks, the opposition accused Ennahda of having a measure of responsibility by taking a soft approach towards extremists.

The Tunisian parliament was set to pass a new constitution on Sunday after the country's national assembly finished drafting the document last week.

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