Rached Ghannouchi Quotes
A stable democratic system cannot be established without the effective participation of the mainstream, moderate, Islamic movement.
This illustrates the major problem of establishing democracy in an Islamic nation. If the mainstream of Islamic people accept democracy as in Turkey, there can be a vibrant democracy. But if the mainstream sees all other religions as heresy and insists on a literal interpretation of the Koran, then democracy is impossible as in Saudi Arabia.
Rached Ghannouchi, Leader of the Tunisian Al Nahda Party, Quoted in Foreign Policy Magazine, December 2011
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
This quotation of a very popular Muslim cleric illustrates the wide range of political views of Islamic leaders and authorities. Whereas most shun democracy as placing public opinion over the word of God, there are many like al-Qaradawi who have a modernist interpretation of Islam.
Ironically, without the word “wicked” most people would regard the first sentence as a good description of elements of a modern democracy. It illustrates that for the Islamic fundamentalist democracy substitutes the rule of man for the rule of God, freedom of speech allows heresy and blasphemy to to uttered and communicated, and religion which is supposed to inform and direct politics. So what is good for the lover of democracy is the very thing that is bad for Islam. This is not a uniquely Islamic viewpoint. It has been and is held by fundamentalist Christians and Jews as well who would return to Biblical law punishing blasphemy and heresy with death and have religion drive all politics.
At the time Turkey and Indonesia were the only Muslim nations that was not dictatorships or a theocracies.
He warned that if there were quick elections, the Islamists being the only organized civil and political organizations were bound to win and then it would be very hard to create civic democratic institutions which would not only be competition for the Islamists but would likely be secular—their worst fear. He generally turned out to be right as Lewis was the Western World’s greatest Islamic Historian,
The "we" referred to the Tunisian Ennahda Party of which he was the founder.
It is precisely for these reasons that large numbers of Muslims consider Ghannouchi and other reformers to be threats to Islam and in need of suppression in order to protect their religion.
Essentially, he is advocating a reformation of the Islamic religion, much like that which has taken place in Christianity and Judaism. However, while most Muslims of the world are not extreme fundamentalists, most of the existing clerics (as did their Christian and Jewish counterparts years ago) turn any attempt at reform into blasphemy and sin. Throughout much of the Islamic world, Muslims who argue publicly for reform are at risk for their lives as the existing Muslim clerics generally encourage attacks on reforms or turn a blind eye to efforts to suppress reform.
Rached Ghannouchi, also spelled Rachid al-Ghannouchi or Rached el-Ghannouchi, is a Tunisian politician and thinker, co-founder of the Ennahdha Party and serving as its "intellectual leader". He was born Rashad Khriji (راشد الخريجي).
