Thousands of Tunisians, especially from poor rural areas, staged an open sit-in before government headquarters in the capital, demanding the dismissal of ousted president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali’s loyalists from the transitional government.
They attacked government officials as they were coming out of the building, and pelted the police with stones.
Security forces managed to disperse the protesters with tear gas.
The Tunisian primary and high school syndicate, for its part, also called for an open strike to topple Mohamed al-Ghannouchi’s government.
Meanwhile, the Tunisian General Union of Labor is meeting with the 14 January Front, which includes eight opposition movements, to discuss the formation of a national or revolutionary council of all political movements, including the Islamists, to rule the country and reform the constitution in order to regulate upcoming elections.
Sources said the opposition mulls keeping al-Ghannouchi as prime minister and distributing the ministerial posts among the various opposition movements, while dismissing the former ruling Constitutional Democratic Rally Party and sequestering its assets.
Head of Al-Tajdid Party Ahmed Ibrahim and member of the Progressive Democratic Party Maher Henein claimed that Libyan President Muammar al-Gaddafi and Muslim scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi pose a threat to the Tunisian revolution.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
