New Tunisian party comprising secular figures coming to light

New Tunisian party comprising secular figures coming to light Political parties and several national figures in Tunisia announced their alliance in a party based on moderation, aiming to establish social justice and consolidate freedoms, according to the initiative launched by the Progressive Democratic Party.
This new alliance, whose name remains unannounced till now, brings together a number of prominent secular forces and figures, top of which is the Progressive Democratic Party (PDP), the Republican Party, Afek Tounes, as well as El Erada party and Blady movement, beside a number of former ministers in Al-Baji Qaid Sisi’s government and some former retired army leaders.
 “We aim at founding a political party enriched with the Islamic Arab civilization values and capable of reviewing a fair and balanced development project,” General Secretary of Afek party and former minister of transportation Yassine Ibrahim said, during the festivities organized to declare the alliance.
“The figures and forces constituting this new party reflect that the Tunisian Opposition is convinced of the need to provide a guarantee for the political balance which is the basis of democratic structure,” he told ‘Arabstoday’.
Nagib Chebbi, founder of Progressive Democratic Party (PDP) expressed on his part that “the initiative seeks to show the true face of Tunisia at a time where its image is relatively marred abroad, due to some stiff religious slogans and restrictions set on freedoms.”
Najib Chebbi assured that “this initiative to combine the modernist centrist parties aims to create a balance of power and to prepare us better for future elections, however, bringing together the largest number of forces is not enough. We must also develop our message and reach all deprived groups.”                
“This step goes in line with the requirements of the current political stage, which requires merging the democratic modernist forces,” Essam chebbi, leader in PDP told ‘Arabstoday’.
 “We learned a lesson from our participation in the Constituent Assembly election on October 23. This initiative comes as a pragmatic solution through the unification of democratic forces of moderation” explaining, “We have suffered as secular parties from a big defeat in the past elections as a result of being not united, and thus failed to configure the counter-forces that can compete with Ennahda movement.”
 “I think the step of opposition parties alliance is a step forward on the way of developing the opposition in order to  play its historical role in sanctifying democracy as such  merger is an opportunity for the development of democracy within the parties,” political analyst Adnan Hasnaoui told ‘Arabstoday’.
Secular forces have fears of decline in freedoms a year after the outbreak of the Revolution, particularly with the arrival of the Islamists to power and the emergence of indicators that threaten these freedoms, issued by the Salafis.