Tunisia: Một Âm Mưu Bẻ Lái Dư Luận hay Sự Ngu Dốt Lậm Chữ của báo chí Mỹ và Tây Phương?

NKPTC
Cuộc cách mạng quần chúng tự phát đang xảy ra ở Tunisia, một quốc gia Bắc Phi, đang được bọn báo chí Mỹ và phương Tây, sai lầm gọi là "Cách Mạng Hoa Nhài- Jasmine Revolution. Đây là một sự cố tình đánh lạc hướng dư luận hay đúng là một sự ngu dốt lậm chữ của bọn phương Tây?

Trong quá khứ, vì ngang ngược và ngu dốt, bọn Tây phương, dẫn đầu là Anh đã đem bộ quần áo nhẹ Pajamas  của xứ nóng  Batư và Ấn khi đô hộ xứ này, vào riêng phòng ngủ để rồi trở thành tên của bộ áo quần đi ngủ cho đến bây giờ.  Và hiện nay chúng nó lại dùng chữ Jasmine Revolution cho cuộc nổi dậy của quần chúng Tunisia.
Cụm danh từ "Cách mạng hương Hoa Nhài", Jasmine Revolution, được người Hồi Bắc Phi dùng để chỉ sự thay đổi quyền lực chính trị từ nội bộ  thiểu số thượng tầng  (Elitism),  do duyên cớ nội sinh trong nhóm  thượng tầng đặc quyền, cho nên mới gọi là Jasmine = Hương tinh túy Hoa Nhài. Đó là trường hợp xảy ra năm 2005, trong cuộc phản đối để thay đổi chính sách từ nội bộ của đảng Baa'th cầm quyền tại Syria. Từ ngữ "Cách mạng Hương Hoa Nhài", cũng dùng để chỉ một cuộc đảo chính êm thắm nội bộ  như cuộc thay đổi quyền lực của chính nước Tunisia  năm 1987 do Mỹ yểm trợ để tên độc tài Ben Ali hiện nay đã bỏ chạy, đảo chính tổng thống của hắn là Habib Bourguiba, êm thắm Ngày 7,tháng 11 năm  1987 với lý cớ tổng thống Habib bị tâm thần và phải được thay thế theo Hiến định. Và từ đó tên độc tài Ben Ali trở thành con cưng của Mỹ và Tây phương tại Bắc Phi cho đến nay.  Cũng như chế độ độc tài Nicolae Caescescu  ở Lỗ Ma Ny (Romania)  con cưng của Mỹ tại Đông Âu xưa kia vậy. Ben Ali là con cưng của Mỹ, của Reagan, Carter, Bush, Rumsfeld, Obama, Clinton và các tờ báo chính qui Mỹ không ngớt ca ngợi và bảo vệ trợ lực cho Ben Ali mấy chục năm nay.. Dù mặt bên trong vẫn biết tỏng chế độ Ben Ali như thế nào. Đó là nội dung bức điện văn được Wikileaks tung ra trước khi cuộc cách mạng tự phát bùng nổ. 
Cuộc cách mạng tự phát này được bùng mạnh từ khi anh sinh viên Mohamed Bouazizi bị sô đẩy xuống cảnh bần cùng phải đi bán trái cây bên vỉa hè đường phố, nhưng vẫn bị nhà nước bắt phạt vạ, ngăn chặn và đòi giấy phép hành nghề bán rong.. Thế là anh   Mohamed Bouazizi  châm lửa tự thiêu. Ngọn lửa tự thiêu này chỉ là giọt nước tràn ly của một sự căm phẫn bất mãn, và nhận thức mong muốn thay đổi chính trị trong quần chúng đã từ lâu tích tụ lại,  và không như hình ảnh anh sinh viên Jan Palach tại Prague năm 1969, ngọn lửa của Bouazizi đã không tắt ngúm dưới bạo lực đàn áp mà lan nhanh rồi bùng mạnh thành cuộc nổi dậy tràn ra đường của  hầu như tất cả ngừoi dân Tunisians. Thế là Ben Ali được Mỹ đánh tháo bỏ chạy bay qua đồng minh Hồi giáo thân cận nhất của Mỹ  tại khu vực là  Arab Seoud để tạm lưu vong, vì nhóm tay sai quyền lực của Ben Ali vẫn còn nắm quyền và đang cố níu bám quyền lực bằng đủ mọi thủ đoạn hứa hẹn ổn định, dĩ nhiên vẫn là trong nỗ lực yểm trợ ngầm của Mỹ.
Hiện nay Cảnh sát  Tunisia cũng đã tham gia cùng người dân xuống đường nhiều hơn để đòi hỏi THAY ĐỔI TOÀN DIỆN, chứ không chấp nhận nhóm cầm quyền cũ thay tên đổi áo.. Có lẽ đây chính là nguyên do bọn Mỹ và đám báo chí chính qui tay sai cố tình dùng chữ Cách mạng Hoa Nhài để đánh lận con đen , lèo lái nỗ lực  chống đối  của quần chúng  khao khát dân chủ thật sự với một chế độ hoàn toàn mới, để thay vào đó chỉ là cuộc thay đổi thượng tầng trong nội bộ tay sai Mỹ  chỉ với sự ra đi của  riiêng Ben Ali mà thôi, và nhóm tay sai Mỹ vẫn nắm quyền.
Tiến trình thay đổi chính trị đang xảy ra tại Tunisia từ nguyên nhân nền tảng cho đến diễn biến, đúng là cuộc cách mạng tự phát đi từ  nhận thức và mong muốn của quần chúng đã được tích tụ  âm ỉ từ trước. Nó có thể là tiếng sét mở  đầu cho cơn giông bão dân chủ sẽ tràn khắp khu vực Trung Đông và Phi Châu,  đe dọa giật sập  các nền  độc tài Hồi giáo và cực hũu do Mỹ và phương tây nuôi dưỡng bao năm nay. Nó không phải là cuộc đảo chính nội bộ để thay đổi thượng tầng quyền lực “Hoa Nhài” như Mỹ mong muốn nữa rồi. Có cố gắng gọi nó là “Hương Hoa Nhài” cũng vô vọng. Khi quần chúng đã có mong muốn từ nhận thức, thì hành động của họ sẽ quả quyết , những hư cấu bịp bợm chữ nghĩa đánh lận con đen không còn lừa dối họ được nữa.
Người dân Tunisia không phải là người dân Việt Nam.  Cứ xét quá khư Bắc Nam với những biến cố  chính trị thoán nghịch đổi thay bình mới rượu cũ như hai nền ngụy quyền ở miền Nam, và các phong trào ngoài Bắc như Cải Cách Ruộng Đất, ấm ớ Nhân Văn Giai Phẩm, rồi  sau 1975 cho đến nay, một lố các  "bô lão "đối lập trung thành cho đến giới "ranh con"  tạp bút đối rập..Với nhận thức dân trí  và "quan trí" loanh quanh lẩn quẩn hết "cơm no áo ấm", lại ái quốc ái quần như thế. của người Việt Nam,  thì một "Cuộc Cách Mạng Hương Hoa Nhài" thật sự  như nước Syria  và đảng Ba'ath còn không thể có, chứ đừng mong gì đến cách mạng quần chúng tự phát như Tunisia hôm nay.
22-01-2011
NKPTC
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Why you shouldn't call it the "Jasmine Revolution"

By Issandr El Amrani January 17, 2011 at 3:08 AM Share

It's not exactly the most important thing about what's going in Tunisia right now, but on Twitter and elsewhere you see a lot of people complaining about media reporting on Tunisia describing the recent events there as a "Twitter Revolution" or even a "Wikipedia revolution" — it just really seems to make people angry. I don't think these are accurate terms, but I am more concerned — as are many Tunisians — about the enthusiasm for the name "Jasmine Revolution," which has become ubiquitous in much of the international media.
There are several reasons this term should not be used. There's nothing wrong in flower revolutions in themselves — the term derives from the very honorable end of the fascist regime in Portugal on 25 April 1974, dubbed the Carnation Revolution. But it unfortunately echoes more recent divisive terms, notably Lebanon's 2005 Cedar Revolution, which is associated with March 14 and US propaganda by a good part of Arab (and other) opinion. Personally, I loved the Syrian pullout out of Lebanon (and its alternative name, more common in Arabic, "Independence Intifada") — but, at the same time, so much spin was put on what was not really a revolution anyway. The term is now poisoned with Lebanon's divisive politics.
Furthermore, in Lebanon — as in Georgia's Revolution of the Roses and Ukraine's Orange Revolution —you also had events that, as positive as they may have been,  are closely intertwined with Bush administration policies, making the flower revolution concept even more divisive. What I'm hearing from Tunisians these days is, "don't you go branding our revolution." For me, that's reason enough to stay away from the term.
But there's another reason to stay away from "Jasmine Revolution." It was the term that deposed President Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali used in 1987 to describe his own takeover, in those initial years of his reign that offered some hope for a democratic transition. To reuse Ben Ali's propaganda phrase at this point seems perverse — whereas something like the Sidi Bouzid Revolution, marking ground zero of the movement that led to the dictator's downfall, seems so much more appropriate.
What’s Going on in Tunisia?
A revolution in progress
by Justin Raimondo, January 17, 2011
The dethronement of Tunisian strongman Ben Ali, and his flight to Saudi Arabia, has our media conjuringvisionsof a powerful upsurge of “democratic” populism in what was previously thought of as a minor backwater, famous for its beaches and little else. A friend of the West, Ben Ali was the spitting image of his predecessor, Habib Bourguiba, whom he overthrew in a bloodless coup. Always tempered by the moderate tone of Tunisian politics, which stresses continuity and stability over revolutionary change, Bourguiba and his Destourian (pro-independence) party took decades to negotiate a peaceful transition from French protectorate to full independence in 1956.
For the next thirty years, Bourguiba managed to tamp down popular discontent in all its forms, from the leftist trade unions to the Islamist militants – the latter a very small minority with limited influence. This was done not so much by outright repression, as in other one-party states during the rise of Third World nationalism in the 1960s, but through cooptation – and the strategic gyrations of Bourguiba, a skillful manipulator of competing interests who never let one faction get the upper hand for very long.
As he got into his late seventies, however, the Tunisian strongman who had successfully steered his country toward independence without an armed struggle – as in neighboring Algeria– went downhill physically and mentally, and his policies became increasingly erratic. Things reached the point where his incapacity was obvious even to his most devoted supporters, and so on November 7, 1987, Ben Ali and his supporters invoked an article of the Tunisian constitution which provides for the transfer of power in case of the president’s incapacity.
In his message to the nationannouncing the succession of power, Ben Ali was careful to pay tribute to his predecessor, who still enjoyed tremendous prestige as the veritable father of the nation. In accordance with the Tunisian temperament, which values moderation and continuity, he stressed his intent to build on the foundations laid down by the previous regime. In spite of the renaming of the Destourian party, which was now the Destourian Socialist Party, the new ruler was determined to keep the country open to Western development and maintain its official nonaligned stance.
The great problem for the regime, however, was its self-insulating and self-perpetuating statism, which encouraged – indeed, made inevitable – the development of a particularly brazen form of crony capitalism, with the economy in the hands of the state – and the state in the firm grasp of Ben Ali’s immediate and extended family. As a WikiLeaked US diplomatic cableput it:
“Whether it’s cash, services, land, property, or yes, even your yacht, President Ben Ali’s family is rumored to covet it and reportedly gets what it wants. Beyond the stories of the First Family’s shady dealings, Tunisians report encountering low-level corruption as well in interactions with the police, customs, and a variety of government ministries. The economic impact is clear, with Tunisian investors – fearing the long-arm of “the Family” – forgoing new investments, keeping domestic investment rates low and unemployment high. These persistent rumors of corruption, coupled with rising inflation and continued unemployment, have helped to fuel frustration with the GOT and have contributed to recent protests in southwestern Tunisia (Ref A). With those at the top believed to be the worst offenders, and likely to remain in power, there are no checks in the system.”
But of course there is always the ultimate check on the system – revolution in the streets. Which is precisely what happened when a young man by the name of Mohamed Bouazizi, a graduate student forced by poverty to sell fruits and vegetables in the market, set himself on fire in protest at having been denied a permit. Apparently he had declined, or could not afford, to pay off the appropriate party-state officials. His desperate act sparked a series of demonstrationswhich soon spread beyond his small town in the southwestern countryside, and in a matter of a few weeks Ben Ali was on a plane and out of power.
Tunisia had a brief fling with economic liberalization in Bourguiba’s day, but this was firmly opposed by both Party militants and Islamists, who feared the social consequences of economic liberty (albeit for different reasons). The liberalizing era was soon halted, however, when Bourguiba saw the opposition it was engendering from his most devoted followers, and when Ben Ali took power there was no similar “liberal” phase. By this time the Destourian apparatus had become completely distanced from the people, with party and state effectively merged and all power vested in the person and family of the President. Elections were held periodically, but there was no effective competition, and besides the whole process was rigged.
As we go to “press,” as they used to say, the Tunisian revolution is far from over. A wing of the ruling party has managed, so far, to retain control, and there is some fighting still going on between Ben Ali loyalists and the New Gang in Charge, but the differences between these two factions is marginal, at best, as underscored by this report:
“A state of emergency has now been declared in Tunisia that bans demonstrations and imposes a strict dusk-to-dawn curfew, with orders given to security forces to shoot anyone disobeying orders or fleeing. “
Meet the new boss – same as the old boss.
The “Jasmine Revolution” is being held up as a hopeful harbinger of things to come in the Arab world: for the first time, we are being told, a sclerotic despotism is being challenged and successfully overthrown by a populist uprising. This is simplistic, to say the least.
To begin with, the folks in charge are hardly revolutionaries, but partisans of the old Tunisian establishment – the party of Bourguiba and Ben Ali. Secondly, the Tunisian temperament is not conducive to revolutionary upsurges in the sense that we understand the concept: Tunisians are no more likely to start their own version of the French Revolution than they are likely to convert en masse to Buddhism. It simply goes against the cultural grain.
Yet there are certain economic imperatives – such as a street vendor’s need to make a living – that militate against a return to the old normalcy. With the world economy undergoing a radical contraction, and countries such as Tunisia entirely dependenton foreign trade and aid, demands for economic liberalization are bound to rise – and surely crony corporatism of the Tunisian or any other variety is going to face increasingly militant challenges.
What this portends for US foreign policy is not all that clear at the moment, but one thing is certain: the US is bound to see this turmoil as a wedge to be used by radical Islamists. This is why we pour billionsinto regimes such as Ben Ali’s – with Egypt’s Hosni Mubaraka very similar case. It’s too late to disavow our support for these tyrants: the history of their collaboration with Washington is too extensiveto be denied. As the economic screws tighten worldwide, and these rigid, reflexively repressive regimes come apart at the seams, the US will be caught between the need to be “pragmatic” (i.e. preserve stability at all costs) and its rhetorical stanceas the standard-bearer of “democracy” and liberalism internationally.
What to do? The only course is to stand aside and let the process work itself out. Intervention at any level is bound to boomerang and have the opposite effect from the one intended. Tunisian nationalism, the overriding ideological force in the nation’s politics and traditions, has a very weak adversary in the Islamist parties, which are all in exile and wield minimal if anyinfluence in the current upsurge. However, that could change if the US hand becomes too apparent: that is, if Washington creates a problem where none presently exists.
The ruling party will no doubt try to secure its tenacious grip on power, and yet that power is being challenged by a secular populist movement. If, if the interests of promoting “stability,” the US gets too close to Ben Ali’s successors, then this will give the Islamists the opening they have been waiting for. I see that our Secretary of State has already made a statement welcoming the prospect of “democratic reform” in Tunisia and calling for calm: if only our public officials did not feel the need to comment on happenings in every country on earth, no matter how far removed from our shores – if only, in short, they would button their lips, for a change, our national interests would be very well served. The best policy, at the moment, is to sit back and watch as the Tunisians take care of business in their own way, and for their own reasons.
Lots of Westerners fell for the “’Tunisian success story” narrative, which Christopher Hitchens limned pretty well in a 2007 articlefor Vanity Fair:
“Who wouldn’t want the alternative of an African Titoism, or perhaps an African Gaullism, where presidential rule keeps a guiding but not tyrannical hand? A country where people discuss micro-credits for small business instead of “macro” schemes such as holy war? Mr. Ben Ali does not make lengthy speeches on TV every night, or appear in gorgeously barbaric uniforms, or live in a different palace for every day of the week. Tunisia has no grandiose armed forces, the curse of the rest of the continent, feeding parasitically off the national income and rewarding their own restlessness with the occasional coup.
“And the country is lucky in other ways as well. … It has been spared the awful toxicity of ethnic and religious rivalry, which makes it very unusual in Africa. Its international airport is named Tunis-Carthage, evoking African roots without Afrocentric demagogy.”
For Hitchens, it is enough that the country is not afflicted with what he regards as the curse of religiosity, and he goes on to detail the views of a female professor of theology attached to a Tunis mosque and university who denies the veil is mandated by the Koran. Hitchens characterizes the Ben Ali regime’s attempts to police the internet as “crude and old-fashioned” – not repressive. His main concern is that Islamist radicals who are not “welcome” in Tunisia are given somewhat freer rein in England, from which they broadcast their message, and he ends his piece with this warning:
“An enclave of development, Tunisia is menaced by the harsh extremists of a desert religion, and ultimately by the desert itself. As with everything else in Africa, this is not a contest we can view with indifference.”
The Bourguibas and Ben Alis who created this “enclave of development” sowed the seeds of their own destruction, and yet as long as no one was rocking the boat Hitchens and his fellow interventionists were willing to tolerate their “old fashioned” tyranny. The problem with this kind of ideological one-dimensionality is that it doesn’t take into account the Mohamed Bouazizis of this world, who yearn to be free.
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Tuesday, May 03, 2005
The Jasmine Revolution?
http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/Joshua.M.Landis-1/syriablog/2005/05/jasmine-revolution.htm
An uprising is taking shape within the Damascus branch of the Baath Party.

A petition is being circulated among Baath members protesting the undemocratic nature of recent party elections. Even cynics had hoped that 10% of the leadership would be new. What happened? Not one new candidate won!

This week, the second round of Party elections was held which set the ground work for the 10th Regional Party Congress to be held in June. On the 25th and 26th of April, Baath Party members voted for candidates in the Damascus region to decide which Party members would rise into the new leadership positions of Branch (fir`a) Director, members of the Branch Leadership, District (Sh`aba) Director and members of the District Leadership. High government appointments were also decided in the elections, including Ministers, Assistant Ministers, and Director Generals, according to Ayman Abdulnour.

It is from the winners of this round of elections that the new Baath Regional Leadership is to be selected. They will debate the larger issues of Party and political reform that have been put forward in four major reports produced by the working committees of the previous Regional Congress. Many Syrians have their hopes for the future pinned on the outcome of this Congress. In theory it will establish the direction of national development for the coming years. It is the institutional and ideological face of the regime.

Many Baath members were not expecting great changes in the party as a result of the voting. A number of Baathists had complained that due to Party procedures a maximum of only 10% of the membership could be changed. New blood would be minimal.

The results were much worse than even the skeptics predicted. Not one new personality was successful in the elections. Writing on April 27 in all4Syria, Ayman Abdulnour disparaged the results:

البارحة واليوم جرت إنتخابات الشعب الحزبية في فرع دمشق للحزب وفرع جامعة دمشق .... وكانت النتائج أسوء مما توقعنا إذ وصلت نسبة أصحاب المهام الحزبية والحكومية إلى 100 % ....أي لم يتمكن أي رفيق , حتى واحد فقط من الوصول على المؤتمر القطري من خارج تلك الدائرة ؟؟؟

No new blood. No hope for change. No hope that the Party can fix itself.

When candidates tried to campaign during the elections they were thwarted at every turn by the Party leaders, who were determined to hang on to their positions. Some candidates tried to print up their resumes and put out a small platform statement laying out their goals. "No," they were told by the party bosses. "You cannot distribute information unless every one does." This attitude of obstruction prevailed at every step of the election process.

The members don't know each other because most don't go to Party meetings. They couldn't pass out elections fliers and there was no printed material supplied by the election offices informing voters who the candidates were. Only general platitudes produced five years ago by the last Party Congress were published and they gave no guidance for voters hungry for information.

As a result the district and governate leadership was all reelected. A number of ministers and heads of the reform working groups failed to win seats. Who will be at the Party Leadership Congress to speak for their proposed reforms? That is the question being asked by a flood of articles published in the alternative press here in Syria - Elaph, SyriaNews.com, and all4Syria. The district and regional leadership were the only people party members knew, so they won the most votes.

Flynt Leverett in his new book quotes President Bashar al-Asad as saying that the old Guard is not four or five big honchos, it is thousands of people inhabiting every level of the government and Party who don't want to lose their positions and privileges and who are frightened by change. In a recent interview Levertt said:
The Old Guard is literally thousands of mediocre and fossilized — those are his words — "mediocre and fossilized" bureaucrats who are throughout the system and who have been entrenched in their positions over years and decades and have no interest in doing anything in a different way.


Dr. Zuhayr Ibrahim Jabour of Tishriin University writes in all4Syria (May 2, 2006) that the Baath Party cannot fix itself and that even if there were democracy within the Party it would probably not deliver the results that the reformers hope for. The officials are opportunists and corrupt, he writes. The Party will collapse because it cannot fulfill the hopes of the Syrian youth who are the majority of the country. It will bring untold suffering to the country if the Party does collapse because of the mindlessness of its members. "Hidden tensions are building up," he writes, "to the point that they can explode at any time. Who knows what destruction that may bring because who knows where it will stop."

في ضوء ذلك نؤكد ودون مبالغة بأن المسار الديموقراطي داخل الحزب لن يكون بالاتجاه الذي يريده الإصلاحيون وبالتالي لن يتمكن الحزب من أن يصبح أداة سياسية فعّالة للانتقال بالوطن إلى مرحلة جديدة تلبي طموحات السوريين وآمالهم...

وهنا نشدد على أن سوريا الجديدة لايبنيها سوريو الزمن الماضي الذين ينبغي وداعهم بعدما جعلوا سوريا تدفع اُثمانا باهظة بسبب أفكارهم ومواقفهم السياسية الخاطئة, ولأن الذين ترهلوا سياسيا وذهنيا عاجزون عن تقديم أي شيء مثمر للشباب السوري الذي يشكل أكبر شريحة عمرية في مجتمعنا والذي يبدي انعدام الثقة واللامبالاة بكل مايجري حوله بعدما اقفلنا أبواب الأمل في وجهه. ولايخفى على العقلاء منا بأن توترا خفيا يتراكم خلف هذه اللامبالاة والذي يمكن أن ينفجر في أية لحظة وينذر بالخراب الذي لانستطيع معرفة حدوده!!

Dr. Ahmad al-Hajj Ali, A member of the Committee to Develop Party Thought and ex-Head of the office of the Central Party Committee, who wrote one of the important reform papers that is to be presented at the upcoming Party Congress wrote an article entitled, "The Experience of the Baath Party Elections: Between the Permissible and the Pillage. He complains bitterly how there was not oversight or application of the rules. The party hacks were able to hold on to their privilege and position.

Al-Hajj Ali asks the million dollar question: So long as there is not a speck of democracy in the Party, how can it expect to lead society and move the country ahead in the world of ideas and realistic policies? So long as it is based on a system of spoils how can it not reward to worst and punish the best?

One of the readers of Syria Comment some weeks ago spoke about the "Jasmine Revolution." Be was referring to Syrian intellectuals and idealistic youth who are fed up with the lack of change and new ideas. They want to see the future open up to them. They want to be part of Syria and participate in building their country. In the last several days, we have even seen the members of the Baath Party crying out for change. The criticism by smart and ambitious Baath members who see just how broken their party has become is gathering steam.

Many hope that they can build pressure on the President that will help him take the bold steps they are hoping for at the Party Congress. Seeing how dysfunctional the system is and how incapable are the state institutions, they have placed all their hope in the hands of the President. It is a terrible burden for the President.

He has been trying to build up his own network of reformers and technocrats in the ministries who can provide him with the expertise and momentum for change. Considering how the Baath Party elections were carried out, it is hard to see how the reformers will be able to rise to the top.

Many in Washington and the West are predicting that the Syrian regime will implode, collapsing in on itself out of pure inertia and corruption. The Baath Party elections will not change these expectations.

The challenge for Syrians is whether they can carry out their jasmine revolution without a collapse of government and without chaos and disorder. It is time for vision at the top and organization below.