Financial corruption, Foreign funding, Money laundering… Ennahdha Movement on the Edge

Corruption of political and economic life, financial and administrative corruption cases, political assassinations, and a long list, all of which are indictments that follow the Tunisian Muslim Brotherhood Ennahdha Movement, accumulated during the ten years that characterized by the ruling of the Muslim Brotherhood in the country, and it is the period that Tunisians call the black decade.

“The above-mentioned accusations are not the only ones, which are prosecuting Ennahdha which led by Rached Ghannouchi, still and all other indictments of receiving foreign funds and working for foreign entities that have emerged, accordingly have long been the subject of judicial investigations”.

     I. Corruption suspicions: 

“One of these indictments was detected by the non-governmental organization “I watch”, which specializes in corruption cases, in a statement released on 5 October 2021, in which it said that Ennahdha had signed two contracts with a foreign company worth more than $355,000, before its 10th conference in 2016 and before the 2018 municipal elections”.

The organization states that it will submit a request to the Court of Accounts to take the measures required by the electoral law against Ennahdha in this regard, adding that it will file a criminal complaint with the prosecutor of the Court of First Instance in Tunis, because there is a suspicion of funds of unknown origin according to the Organic Law number 26 of 2015, which is related to combating terrorism and forbidding money laundering.

Tunisian law prohibits political parties from accepting direct or indirect funding from any foreign entity and forbids possession of funds abroad, and considers the search for foreign support as a crime.

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     II. Judicial investigation:

Indeed, the Brotherhood has been under two judicial investigation for months because of suspicions that it has received funds of unknown origin. The first one relates to the Lobbying contract, which was concluded by Ennahdha at the end of July, to campaign for its interests in the United States, to facilitate the party’s communication with essential actors, and to provide media support in order to form a pressure group against President Kais Saied following his exceptional decisions.

As for the second investigation, it was opened by the Economic and Financial Judiciary in mid-July, on the Lobbying contracts, which relate to obtaining foreign funding for the election campaign and accepting anonymous funds. This is based on what was divulged in the final report of the Audit Department on the results of monitoring the funding of the premature presidential elections and the 2019 legislative election.

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     III. Dead donation to the movement:

“In a bizarre and outrageous incident, the Court of Accounts, which considers as the country’s highest judicial oversight body in its report of 2019 on local elections, monitored misconduct and suspicious funds in Ennahdha’s election campaigns, specifically between 2016 and 2018, and revealed that there were financial donations in the names of dozens of people who had passed away in favor of the movement”.

“The court’s report revealed that the Ennahdha donation receipts contained the identities of 68 donors, who were later identified by civil status records as dead, 25 of whom had died between 3 and 11 years before the donation date”.

The Court also recorded in its report other observations, including the absence of donor signature in some 329 receipts, out of approximately 13,000 donations.

In July, the former head of the anti-corruption commission, Chawki Tabib, revealed that some political parties had illegal financing, and that many of them did not seek transparency in the statement of their funding, especially during election periods. He confirmed the existence of external funding, and accused foreign parties of employing local political parties by financing them.

The decree regulating the activity of political parties in Tunisia requires each party to submit an annual report, including a detailed description of its sources of funding and expenditures, to the Auditing Department, but most parties do not.

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     IV. Money laundering:

In September 2020, Mohamed Abbou, the government official in charge of the fight against corruption, accused Ennahdha of laundering money under the cover of television stations. During a press conference held before leaving his ministerial post with the appointment of a new government, he announced that he had referred to the public prosecution a file concerning Ennahdha’s possession of four television channels, in order to cover up illegal actions.

He added: We get testimonies from inside these channels, and various data and strong evidence that this process can only be money laundering, because the advertisements broadcast by these channels cannot cover their expenses for all these years; this is a categorical proof.

Abbou accused Ennahdha of being linked to corrupt and foreign money, asserting that it claims to overthrow the government of Elyes Fakhfakh on the grounds of corruption, despite the fact that it lives with illegal funds. Altogether, he revealed that the lawsuit he filed with the judiciary also relates to Ennahdha’s properties, cars and headquarters, as well as to the report of the Court of Accounts regarding the presence of individuals donating money to the movement, which were found to have died at the date of donation.

Nourreddine Ben Tisha, a former political adviser to the late President Beji Caid el Sebsi, said that the accusation came from a minister whose party was participating in the government coalition with Ennahdha, and it is clear that he has data and evidence to confirm what he adopted. He called on the judiciary to reveal the facts and search seriously for details, as it’s been a long time that many people was talking about the large amount of money Ennahdha owns and about its control over some television and media channels, among others.

Nourreddine Ben Tisha added that the time has come to uncover the sources of funding. He added that there are those who talk about the abnormal richness of some leaders in the party, who owned nothing before January 14, 2011, and today owns apartments, real estate and properties.

“It makes no sense for Ennahdha to have all these headquarters, to allocate all these funds at events, campaigns and conferences, and not have a lot of money”, expressed Abid Briki, secretary-general of the Tunisia forward movement, adding that “all observers agree that a normal party cannot achieve 20% of what Ennahdha achieves with this funds”.

In the face of all these charges and lawsuits, will the Brotherhood’s Ennahdha succeed in obscuring the truth about its funding sources?

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