In a mysterious meeting in the winter of 1974, Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi managed to persuade then-Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba to sign the unity agreement between the two countries and establish the Islamic Arab Republic. But the project was in its infancy and did not last more than 24 hours.
To complement the Arab unity projects that the region witnessed during that period, and to realize his Nasserist dream, the late Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi, after a long round of negotiations, succeeded in persuading then-Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba to sign the Unity Agreement between the two countries on January 12, 1974, and to establish The Islamic Arab Republic, with Bourguiba as its president, and Gaddafi as its deputy and commander of the armed forces.
The announcement of the agreement at that time, amid the ambiguity surrounding the meeting, surprised the local and international public opinion. Critical reactions followed the decision, and many parties tried to push the Tunisian president to reverse this step.
Indeed, the Unity Agreement did not see the light of day for more than 24 hours and was still in its infancy. At that time, a severe crisis erupted between the two countries, and a cold war erupted between them that lasted for years, which was only stopped by Gaddafi's handing over of the document of agreement to Bourguiba, and thus, the two sides opened a new page.
Negotiations ended with unity under one banner
Despite his initial insistence on rejecting the proposal, Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba eventually accepted unification with Libya under one banner, and was not deterred by the faltering of the rest of the unionist projects in the region.
At the time, many, especially those around the Tunisian president, wondered how Gaddafi had succeeded in convincing him of this, after he had repeatedly failed to negotiate with his counterpart.
On his last visit to Tunisia, specifically a few months before the signing of the unity agreement, the Tunisian president spoke to the masses, declaring his rejection of Gaddafi’s project, saying: “Muammar Gaddafi came to me and offered me the rule of the two republics. But he lacks experiences and information, he lacks knowledge of how brains change, and how nations are formed.”
Bourguiba added, "Libya needs to unify the ranks of its men. It needs to unify Tripoli and Cyrenaica, which is separated from it by a wide desert, in which they live as in the Middle Ages."
He stressed, "Why do peoples unite? To get stronger, and in this state of weakness, weakness and scientific and technological delay, it will not make us stronger if we add one and a half million Libyans to five million Tunisians."
Thus, the Tunisian president's speech at the time was definitive in his decision to reject the unity project. Nevertheless, the Libyan president continued his relentless attempts. The scales quickly turned after that, in the winter of 1974, when on January 12, Gaddafi asked to meet Bourguiba urgently and privately on the Tunisian island of Djerba, and a meeting between them lasted for only an hour.
Tunisian analysts and politicians said that Gaddafi took advantage of the absence of the two decision-making poles in the Tunisian regime, Prime Minister Hedi Nouira and Bourguiba's wife Wassila Bourguiba, to convince the Tunisian president of the feasibility of his project.
To this day, no one knows the truth of the dialogue and trade-offs that took place between the two presidents during the meeting.
As soon as the meeting ended, and in the presence of a crowd of officials, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi announced the unity between the two Arab countries, Tunisia and Libya, that they would be one republic called the “Islamic Arab Republic” with one constitution, one flag, one army, and one legislative, executive and judicial powers, and its president, Habib Bourguiba, his deputy, and the commander. For the armed forces of Muammar Gaddafi. The agreement stipulated that a popular referendum would be held on January 18 of the same year.
Tunisian politicians, intellectuals and officials were surprised by the speed of the decision, which did not take into account the social and economic disparity between the two countries and the contradiction in the political and constitutional systems.
On the same day, Gaddafi presented a document to Bourguiba containing proposals for the composition of the new unity government, and it was clear that he had focused in his proposals on the distribution of security and sensitive positions. Among Gaddafi's proposals at the time was the appointment of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who later became president of Tunisia, as head of military intelligence.
Immediately, interventions and pressures from a wide range of Tunisian politicians and officials set in, for Bourguiba to reverse his decision, and the Tunisian president actually hit a legal obstacle in the Tunisian constitution, which prevented the organization of the popular referendum stipulated in the agreement.
Tunisian-Libyan unity in the winds
In front of the legal obstacle in the Tunisian constitution, and in the face of the objection of a wide range of Tunisian politicians and officials, and with Algeria’s refusal to join the project on the grounds that it has dire consequences for the region, and Morocco’s reservation about that, in addition to the negative reactions towards the unity decision, the Tunisian president decided to inform his Libyan counterpart By retracting the Djerba Agreement, and asked him to return the document signed by the two parties.
The decision sparked shock and anger for the Libyan president, and a political and diplomatic crisis erupted between the two countries. At the time, Gaddafi refused to hand over the agreement document, amid fears from the Tunisian president that Libya would use this document in the future after his death to pressure Tunisia and subjugate it.
The Libyan president did not accept the failure of the unity project and the Islamic Arab Republic uttered its breath, and he tried to communicate several times with the Tunisian president and many important parties in the Tunisian regime, but all attempts failed, and it became impossible to revive the project that was in its cradle within 24 hours.
Tensions between the two countries took many phases and faces and witnessed many critical junctures, to the extent that the Tunisian authorities later accused Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi of masterminding the events of the city of Gafsa, located in the southwest of Tunisia, in 1980, when a group of armed opponents of a nationalistic orientation took control of the country. On the city to overthrow Bourguiba's rule.
The Tunisian authorities were able to thwart the operation and execute those involved after a series of trials. Thus, the situation between the two neighbors, Libya and Tunisia, worsened more and more.
Amid the insistence of the Tunisian president to restore the unity document bearing his signature, and the crisis between the two countries to enter a dangerous turning point, Gaddafi went to Tunisia in 1982 and handed the document to Bourguiba to turn the page on the dispute, and thus ended his dream in the Islamic Arab Republic.
