IV. Political Environment

U.S.- Tunisian Relations

There are no political issues which have an important effect on
Tunisia's business climate.  Tunisia and the U.S. enjoy close
bilateral relations in all fields.  President Ben Ali and his
government are firmly committed to good relations with the U.S.,
briefly interrupted during the Gulf crisis, when Tunisia took a
sympathetic stance towards Iraq.  Tunisia has hosted the PLO
since 1982 and has been a force for moderation in the Middle East
Peace Process.  The Tunisian government has also contributed
military contingents to U.N. peacekeeping missions in Cambodia,
Somalia, the Western Sahara, and Rwanda.  Cooperation between the
Tunisian and U.S. military has been growing, with an increasing
number of joint exercises.

Tunisia is particularly worried about the instability caused by
Islamist extremists in neighboring Algeria.  Tunisia is bordered
on the east by Libya, a state ostracized by the international
community for its involvement in the Lockerbie tragedy of 1988.
Tunisia honors the sanctions imposed by the U.N. Security Council
on Libya.

U.S. economic assistance programs are being phased out,
principally because of Tunisia's impressive economic development
achievement.


Synopsis of Political System

The Government of the Republic of Tunisia is headed by a
President (since 1987, Zine el Abidine Ben Ali) elected directly
by universal suffrage for a five-year term.  Under the
constitution, the President may be elected for a maximum of three
terms.  Cabinet members are named by the President and are
responsible only to him.  The 163 members of the unicameral
parliament, the Chamber of Deputies, are elected for five-year
terms.  One hundred forty-four deputies are elected on party
lists in Tunisia's 25 electoral districts under a winner-take-all
system.  To ensure minimal representation of minority parties,
nineteen additional seats are distributed proportionally on a
national basis among the losers in the district balloting.  In
the March 1994 election, the voters gave President Ben Ali his
second electoral mandate.  In the same election, the ruling
Democratic Constitutional Rally (RCD) won all 144 district
parliamentary seats.  Four opposition parties split the 19
proportional seats, with the Movement of Socialist Democrats
(MDS) winning 10 spots.  The next presidential and legislative
elections are slated for 1999.  Municipal elections are scheduled
for May 1995.

Ben Ali's governing RCD is a pragmatic political grouping,
committed to economic liberalization, political democratization,
and Middle East peace.  The RCD is the dominant force on the
Tunisian political scene.  The largest opposition party (MDS)
usually supports RCD policies.  Four of the five other opposition
parties differ only slightly.  The Renewal Movement (former
Communist party) and the Popular Unity Party (PUP) are somewhat
more socialist-oriented than the RCD, calling for a slower paced
privatization program.  The Unionist Democratic Union (UDU)
attempts to appeal to labor unionists and is, at present, the
remaining pan-Arabist.  The small Socialist Progressive Party
(RSP), without a seat in the Chamber of Deputies, lacks a
consistent political and economic orientation, but remains Arab
nationalist.  The tiny social Liberal Party (PSL), also
unrepresented in parliament, with little popular following,
favors faster economic liberalization.