Early political career of Habib Bourguiba

With his friends Tahar Sfar, Mahmoud El Materi, Bahri Guiga and his brother M'hamed, they sensitized lower classes to their cause and changed the Residence policy.

In an article he wrote in Le Croissant, a newspaper managed by his cousin Abdelaziz El-Aroui, Bourguiba denounced the festivities as a "humiliating affront to the dignity of the Tunisian people to whom France recalls the loss of freedom and independence".

He questioned both its effects and existence, writing: A State can not be both subject and sovereign: Any treaty of protectorate, because of its nature, carries its own seed of death [...] Is it a lifeless country, a degenerate people who declines?

Is it, in contrary, a sain people, vigorous, that international races or a momentary crisis forced them to accept the tutelage of a strong state, the necessarily inferior status imposed upon them, the contact of a more advanced civilization determines in them a salutary reaction [...] a real regeneration occurs in them and through judicious assimilation, they inevitably come to realize in stages their final emancipation.

Time will tell if the Tunisian people belong to one or the other category.La Voix du Tunisien became a very popular newspaper because of the originality with which Bourguiba, Sfar, Guiga and Materi addressed problems.

Bourguiba reckoned the end of the protectorate as the outcome of an evolution that had taken its roots in the very principles of French civilization, unlike Abdelaziz Thâalbi, who thought of it as a breakup, in an article he wrote in La Tunisie martyre.

Hostile to their daring plea, the preponderants wrote in La Tunisie française: "Mr Bourguiba proposes to transform the Destourian lament into a doctoral thesis in law.

[3] During the conference he held in November 1973, Bourguiba related the events of his beginnings in journalism and the success of his articles:[4] A strong turmoil had broken in Tunisia.

They seriously bothered French people because they did not only paint a grim picture of the current conditions, they also denounced, through logical deductions, the hidden agendas of authorities and exposed their concealed wills.

[3] Chedli Khalledi, a member of the Destour party, alerted Marius Moutet and Gaston Bergery, chief of staff to Édouard Herriot, who were friends of the nationalists and had influence in Paris.

Bergery quickly interfered, contacted the head of the African-Orient department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and obtained an adjournment of their hearings to June 9, 1931.

[1] Awaiting trial, the editors of La Voix du Tunisien launched a press protest campaign whose tone was both violent and revolutionary.

[6] A drafting committee was formed that included Habib and M'hamed Bourguiba, Bahri Guiga, Tahar Sfar, Mahmoud El Materi and Ali Bouhageb, who also managed the publishing firm.

Bouhajeb devoted an entire section of the newspaper for this purpose, which he called La Voix du guenillard, while the other members of the drafting committee wrote in turn in their editorials.

As long as there will be satiated and hungry at the same table, open or sneaky war is a necessity, the use of force is a duty and peace among men a chimera.In February 1933, a major fight within L'Action Tunisienne turned into a crisis, following the case of M'hamed Chenik, banker and chairman of the Tunisian Credit Union, which dominated the medina.

In 1932, Chenik went to Paris as the vice-president of the Tunisian representatives of the Great Council, in order to alert the French government about the problems of indigenous agriculture.

France decided to designate a committee chaired by Louis Tardy, manager of the National Agricultural Credit Fund, to investigate the situation in Tunisia.

Only Bourguiba disapproved of the reaction of his friends, that he qualified as primary, writing: "I had there a first-hand witness who would give me weapons against the Protectorate and means to strengthen my position towards this regime.

"[11][12] Even though some people argued that Bourguiba acted out of personal interest, (he and his brother were tied to the bank by a loan), his aims were mainly related to reviving Tunisian nationalism.

He wrote: "We need to focus our attention on the event that had happened, on the argument which had been offered, so that we could widen our movement to important social classes of the nation, once indifferent or hostile to our program".

In this report of many pages, carefully typed and initialed, Mr Chenik, who had probably been in trouble with his French colleagues, violently criticized the colonial administration and the Tardi committee.

[13] While the Great Council gathered to adjudicate on the agricultural budget, inspired by the recommendation of the Tardi committee, Bourguiba sent out a "supreme warning", writing: "We will be particularly inexorable against the last-minute setbacks or interested jilting."

Citing a verse of the Qur'an, we developed the argument that, by ceasing to be amenable to the Sharaa Court, the naturalized French ipso facto lost his Muslim attributes", he declared in 1973.

[4] Italy, fearing a major naturalization of its citizens, brought a discreet but active support to Bourguiba, decided to discredit the French initiatives and build a reputation.

[18] In order to stop the turmoil that worsened in the country every time a naturalized died, the Residence demanded a fatwa, in April, from the Sharaa Court of Tunis, the highest religious body of the protectorate.

The Maliki and Hanafi sheikhs in charge of the case issued a sentence that solves nothing: They maintained the apostate status of a naturalized but said that if he repented, even verbally, before his death, burial in Muslim lands will be granted.

[19] Bourguiba denounced the duplicity of religious authorities, the provocations of the government, cast aspersions on naturalized and criticized the Destourian press whose "caution considered as the ultimate strategy seems overwhelmed".

Meanwhile, the Residence took a two-phased decision: Firstly, it yielded deciding that naturalized will be buried in special burial place, which appeared to be ghettos excluding them from the community.

We felt strongly embarrassed to be subject to scandal, and so much more when the protectorate authorities were pushing the precautionary measures to maintain the naturalized's graves under the spotlight, at night, in order to protect them from any profanation.

Bourguiba made a speech criticizing the "outdated futile methods and the illusions of the leaders and their program that does not meet the aspirations of the people, who are therefore aware of his case".