Mehdi Jomaa ( ar, مهدي جمعة; born 21 April 1962) is a Tunisian engineer and was the acting

Prime Minister of Tunisia The prime minister of Tunisia ( ar, رئيس حكومة تونس, ra’īs ḥukūmat Tūnis) is the head of the executive branch of the government of Tunisia. The prime minister directs the executive branch along with the president and, together ...

from 29 January 2014 to 6 February 2015. He was chosen on 14 December 2013. Jomaa was Minister of Industry in the Ali Laarayedh government.

Early life

He was born on 21 April 1962 in

Mahdia Mahdia ( ar, المهدية ') is a Tunisian coastal city with 62,189 inhabitants, south of Monastir and southeast of Sousse. Mahdia is a provincial centre north of Sfax. It is important for the associated fish-processing industry, as well as w ...

, Tunisia. He graduated from the National Engineering School,

Tunis ''Tounsi'' french: Tunisois , population_note = , population_urban = , population_metro = 2658816 , population_density_km2 = , timezone1 = CET , utc_offset1 ...

in 1998. He is an engineer by profession. He also holds a postgraduate degree in structural mechanics and in modeling. He spent most of his career at Hutchinson and at Total. He is married and has five children. He was a general manager at Hutchinson Aerospace when he quit his job.

Political life

After

Hamadi Jebali Hamadi Jebali ( ar, حمادي الجبالي, '; born 12 January 1949) is a Tunisian engineer, Muslim politician and journalist who was Prime Minister of Tunisia from December 2011 to March 2013. He was the Secretary-General of the Ennahda Mov ...

asked him to be part of his government, he quit his professional career to contribute to the country's transition into democracy after the crackdown of

Zine El Abidine Ben Ali Zine El Abidine Ben Ali ( ar, زين العابدين بن علي, translit=Zayn al-'Ābidīn bin 'Alī; 3 September 1936 – 19 September 2019), commonly known as Ben Ali ( ar, بن علي) or Ezzine ( ar, الزين), was a Tunisian politician ...

government in the 2011 uprising. He did not belong to any political party; he was an

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

. On 13 March 2013, he became Minister of Industry in a coalition government led by

Ennahda The Ennahda Movement ( ar, حركة النهضة, Ḥarakatu n-Nahḍah; french: link=no, Mouvement Ennahdha), also known as the Renaissance Party or simply known as Ennahda, is a self-defined Islamic democratic political party in Tunisia. Fou ...

after Ali Laarayedh appealed him to be part of his government. After the assassination of Mohamed Brahmi in July, there had been a political deadlock. To ease the situation, parties entered a national dialogue which was held for weeks; on 14 December 2013, both ruling and opposition parties agreed to choose Jomaa as the interim Prime Minister until the next election. His government was

technocratic Technocracy is a form of government in which the decision-maker or makers are selected based on their expertise in a given area of responsibility, particularly with regard to scientific or technical knowledge. This system explicitly contrasts wi ...

. The leftist

Popular Front A popular front is "any coalition of working-class and middle-class parties", including liberal and social democratic ones, "united for the defense of democratic forms" against "a presumed Fascist assault". More generally, it is "a coalition ...

coalition doubted whether he could handle the present situation. His caretaker government carried out the process for new elections and attempted to deal with the economic issues. After Habib Essid became Prime Minister in February 2015, Mehdi Jomaa spent a year away from political life until in early February 2016 he announced the formation of a think-tank and political program dubbed " Tunisia Alternatives". A year later, in March 2017, he converted Tunisia Alternatives into a political party.Frida Dahmani
"Tunisie : Mehdi Jomâa lance son parti politique"
''Jeune Afrique'', 29 March 2017 .

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jomaa, Mehdi 1962 births Government ministers of Tunisia Living people Prime Ministers of Tunisia Grand Crosses 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Tunisian Muslims People from Mahdia 20th-century Tunisian people 21st-century Tunisian people Candidates for President of Tunisia