President of the National Federation of Tunisian Municipalities (FNCT) Adnene Bouassida expressed concern over the decentralisation process and the code local communities.
For him, the real problem does not lie in the attachment of local affairs structures to the Ministry of the Interior, but rather in “the fate of the decentralisation process and the Code of local communities”.
The cabinet meeting, which was held on November 4 under the chairmanship of the President of the Republic, reviewed a draft decree on the attachment of the structures of the Local Affairs Ministry to the Interior Ministry.
Speaking to TAP on Sunday, Bouassida said he is worried to see the decentralisation process canceled, rolling back the gains obtained after 2010 and reverting to the 1975 law, or of dissolving municipal councils and go back to special delegations.
For Bouassida, the decentralisation process is “the greatest achievement made after 2010. It is a vector for development and has proven its effectiveness all over the world, as well as in Arab countries such as Algeria, which allocates 12% of its budget to municipalities. So does Morocco at 10% “.
On the other hand, he stressed that successive governments in Tunisia have not backed the decentralisation process. The State dedicated to it only 2.75% of its budget. This confirms the lack of political will to consolidate it although it is a genuinely economic development system.
He explained that the role of municipalities today is not restricted to infrastructure and town planning. Several municipalities, he said, have introduced reforms during the three years of establishing local governance.
