They set off from Sidi Bouzid on foot, as is their will, for who can stop them? They were supposed to arrive on Tuesday but as the caravan grew & grew somewhere in the dead, cold hours of this morning drivers worked to get them to the governmental Kasbah by the time Ghannoushi the Prime Minister was set to start another of his interminable & maybe numbered days.
"The people want to bring down the government." Sung over & over again. The Tunisian expression, "in repetition there are benefits" couldn't be more timely.
Just as a surreal but relative calm came to the Avenue, the focus shifts to the Kasbah. Despite their divisions, the energy, the force, the persistence of these voices will be heard. As news spread throughout the day of the arrival of the caravan from 250 kilometres south, many arriving for their first time in the capital, the carnival/protest grew. The exhausted lay on the outskirts, lying together in their stupor, some desperately fighting their heavy eyes with bread, cheese, milk, biscuits & fags, from an increasingly organised team of donators. People were lighting fags & throwing them up to the boys hanging from the windows, others kissing & embracing their tired brothers.
Younes from Sidi Bouzid said he was staying until all of the incuments from RCD have gone. He said he wanted "to be a citizen for the first time. To have my dignity. Why should I be forced from my home & family to find work cleaning toilets in Europe? I'll stay & God willing life will be better." The non exhausted sang, danced, went away to eat, came back & sang & danced some more. "Hey hey rain, clean the trees leaves, a dream - like a rose - grows & the crescent moon becomes full. Enter the huts & shanty towns & water the angry flowers & inform my country's tears that the one who will wipe them away has come. Drop by drop on the paths, sing for the heart's thirst. Do not fear the clouds O free land, good times always follow the bad." A poem by Hamza Namira, an Egyptian singer. Not your average protest chant.
Meanwhile, the TV team from Hannibal were abused & forced to leave the scene with people beating their van & swearing. Later we learnt that the owner, Larbi Nasra, has been arrested & charged with treason. Treason? Accused of broadcasting false information before & after the 14th of January & for now trying to "incite strife" & bring back the old regime. The channel was closed for most of the afternoon & later brought back. The revenge begins. He was known to be a distant relative of Leila Ben Ali. A sign that the "interim" "government" want to distance themselves from Ben Ali's precendence? But by closing a channel & arresting its head? Their programmes last night were mainly of people in Gafsa & Sidi Bouzid relating their experiences of the last few weeks & something more extraordinary, a presenter of Hannibal was talking frankly on camera to another journalist admitting how often, to keep their jobs, they were obliged to read out non- story government stories & relate the latest government initiatives, in order to maintain the status-quo that Ben Ali's reign was a stable & progressive one. It stinks. But like so much else, this information comes, is not spoken of by any "authority" (in the Hannibal case an anonymous "authorised" source released a statement..) & a new day begins.
The maincured walls are covered in grafitti. The army stand & watch as occasionally some of the songs are directed at them. They smile, not too hard. The Prime Minister, even if he was in his office, wouldn't be able to get out and won't be able to get in tomorrow morning either. No wonder he isn't saying anything. And the elections? What of them? What of the inheritors & the new leaders? Where are their manifesto's, their programmes? No one in this crowd is asking for them. It's too early. It's a non violent unofficial official coup d'etat with half an etat still avoiding the void.
