Returning to Tunisia after a long absence

'In my first visit to Tunis in twenty five years, I was amazed by what has been achieved,' says Gerald Zarr .

There's a saying in the US Foreign Service that goes like this: “When you leave a country don't go back. The changes will disappoint you - and there's a good chance the country has nosedived.” This may sound harsh but my personal experience backs it up. Of three countries where I lived for a total of 10 years, Haiti continued its downward spiral, Liberia ended up a failed state, and the relatively easy-going Pakistan I knew banned booze, horse racing and public dancing and morphed into an Islamic republic.

But on the plus side is Tunisia. From 1978 to 1980, my family and I lived in Carthage (yes, that Carthage!), nine miles away from Tunis where I worked as the lawyer for the United States Agency for International Development. (This was back in the days when Tunisia still needed foreign aid.) Next to our house were a ruined Byzantine basilica and Roman theater where open air concerts thrilled us or kept us awake at night, depending on how we felt about the artist. Down the road was the picturesque village of Sidi Bou Said, perched high on a cliff above the sea, with its whitewashed houses and blue painted wrought iron windows, bathed in the scent of jasmine.

In May, I was back in Tunisia for my first visit in twenty five years and I was amazed by what has been achieved. Tunis has been spruced up and now looks more like a southern European city than a part of North Africa. But in the transition, I found little that was lost. Sidi Bou Said is even more alluring – if that is possible.

Millions of European tourists visit Tunisia each year, as they did back when I lived there, drawn by its Mediterranean ambience, beach resorts, Roman ruins and reasonable cost. Yet there is a new slant to Tunisian tourism: one million North Africans come to Tunisia for holidays and family reunions because their own countries are either too dangerous (Algeria) or too straitlaced (Libya). To date, North Americans - to their loss - represent a miniscule part of the tourist population.

Over the years, Tunisia has had to cope with serious challenges. In the 1980s, Muammar al Qaddafi was rattling sabers next door in Libya and Islamic fundamentalism – already on the spread in Algeria - was roiling Tunisian society. Both forces aimed to bring down the moderate secular government of Habib Bourguiba, the French-educated lawyer who led the independence struggle and later proved himself a determined reformer, a Tunisian Ataturk.

One of Bourguiba's first acts as head of state was to abolish polygamy and emancipate women through the Personal Status Act of 1956, still viewed as groundbreaking legislation in the Muslim world. Family planning clinics sprung up throughout Tunisia, giving women real reproductive choice. With fewer children to raise, women enthusiastically entered the labor force. President Ben Ali who took power in 1987 continued and even accelerated the reforms.

Tunisians are religious, but religion doesn't dominate public life as in many Muslim countries. Friday is prayer day, but the weekend is Saturday and Sunday. Many Tunisians, being good Muslims, don't drink but they still take pride in the country's wine-growing tradition that dates back to Carthage and Imperial Rome. Even during the month long fast of Ramadan, Tunisians jam the beaches playing football, honing their ball-handling skills that nearly got them to the Round of Sixteen in this year's World Cup.

On March 20, 2006, Tunisians celebrated fifty years of independence, with much to be proud of: 80% of Tunisians own their own homes, two/thirds are middle class, and universal primary education is a reality for boys and girls throughout Tunisia. Life expectancy is now 74 years, as compared with 50 years at independence, and the poverty rate has dropped to a remarkably low 6%.

Part of the reason for Tunisia's success lies in the fact that it doesn't have oil. Unlike its oil-rich North African neighbors, Tunisia has had to develop its human capital and use its ingenuity to make its way in the world. As Thomas L. Friedman wrote in The Lexus and the Olive Tree “you will see a gap emerge in the Middle East between Tunisia – which in the 1990s adopted many of the habits of effective countries – and some of its Arab neighbors, which have not.” As a result, Tunisia's rate of economic growth has rarely dipped below five percent.

I'm delighted to have seen the Tunisia of today and look forward to many happy returns.

(c) 2006 Gerald Zarr