Sidi Arbi – My Master, the Arab

“Sidi Arbi” (My Master, the Arab) is an enquiry into the controversial sense of
identity amongst the inhabitants of north Africa, and especially Tunisia.
It’s a historical analysis of the tragic Arabization of north African natives, cultural hegemony and the prevalence and spread of hardline Islamism as an ideology during the last decade.

Lyrics:
Look who’s coming to congratulate us, Our country is open for everyone…
Just wash your feet before you come in
The Arabs eradicated us to bring the religion of god!
and raped our women by the same occasion…
Lucky is who strips us of our riches and sell us into slavery
and earned a fortune while doing so
then came the rule of the Arabs’ pigs
Seeds of the ottomans

they raised the price of the bitter bread
Burned down our harvest
Sold the fertile
“Praise our lord prophet!”
They silenced free speech
Killed the flame of our revolution
and gave gave Sheikha Moza(1)
the power to rule over you!

Look who’s coming to congratulate us, Our country is open for everyone..
Welcome be the macho king!
The Arabs eradicated us to bring the religion of god!
Butchered us with their swords!
Lucky is who strips us of our riches and sell us into slavery
He perished miserably in exile(3)
Then came the rule of the Arabs’ pigs
and those of Israel

Dead babies in cupboard boxes(4)
Worker women dead in truck accidents(5)
Protesters shot with buckshots in Siliana(6)
“Praise our lord prophet!”
They silenced free speech
Killed the flame of our revolution
and gave gave Sheikha Moza(1)
the power to rule over you and me!

Rewrite the past and the present
You the people who have forgotten who you are
Stand up and knock off the Sheikh(7)
Who sucked your blood for years
Come back to life, you still have a fight left in you
You still have your brave women and men
Resist however you can, despite your hunger and ignorance
your light must prevail over the darkness…in you

References:
(1) Sheikha Moza bint Nasser is the former Ruler of Qatar’s Wife and she is used as a reference to the Qatari influence on Tunisia’s politics and economy during the early years of the Islamism rule after the Tunisian revolution.

(3) A reference to Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the former Tunisian president, ousted during the Arab spring and exiled in Saudi Arabia where he died in 2019.
(4) A reference to the decaying Tunisian public health service and infrastructure. In March 2019 11 newborns died in a public hospital in Tunis and their dead bodies were handed over to their parents in cupboard boxes.
(5) A reference to the extreme poverty and economical exploitation of women in poor rural areas, where they are transported in open pickups with no security to the fields where they work. In April 2019 one of the pickups crashed, killing 12 women
(6) A reference to the prevalence of brutality and the excessive use of force by the Tunisian police after the revolution. In 2012 Tunisian riot police fired live buckshots on civilians during clashes in the city of Siliana
(7) Sheikh Rached El Ghannouchi, the leader of the Islamism political party Ennahda, who is responsible for much of Tunisia’s problems since the revolution. The Sheikh here also represent the patriarchal and the religious figure.

سيدي العربي