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      Gen Z Problems: Maxwell Frost Is Struggling to Rent an Apartment

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      Other young adults, who have poor credit history and are frustrated with expensive rental application fees, can relate to the housing troubles of the first Gen Zer elected to Congress.WASHINGTON — At 25, Representative-elect Maxwell Frost will be youngest member of Congress. He’s also in debt, after maxing out credit cards to win Florida’s 10th Congressional District seat.He said he was upfront about his bad credit when he applied for a one-bedroom apartment in Washington, D.C., where he now has to live part-time for at least the next two years. A broker, he said, told him that was fine. He paid a $50 application fee and then was denied the apartment because of his poor credit history.Mr. Frost, the first Gen Zer elected to Congress and a Democrat, took to Twitter in early December to voice his frustration: “This ain’t meant for people who don’t already have money.”While most other Gen Zers haven’t accrued campaign debt, Mr. Frost’s housing woes have generated a wide range of commiserating among Gen Z Twitter users who have short credit histories and less capital to afford expensive deposits and application fees.Mr. Frost said he also lost hundreds of dollars last year when he was searching for housing in his home district in Orlando.“Application fees are becoming a source of revenue for management companies,” Mr. Frost said in an interview. “We live in a world right now where you can run an extensive background check for $15, why are fees up to $200? Why do we use a credit score to determine if an applicant can pay rent when there’s so many things that hurt someone’s credit score?”The fees are the sour cherry on top of a brutal housing market: Last month, the typical asking rent in the United States was over $2,000, up from $1,850 in November 2021 and $1,600 in November 2020, according to data from Zillow. For Washington D.C., the typical asking rent was over $2,200 last month, a figure that’s been following the national trajectory.Some Gen Zers see no feasible way to get a place of their own: Nearly a third of people between the ages of 18 and 25 are living at home permanently, one recent report found.Raegan Loheide, 25, started looking for a new apartment with their partner and their current roommate last May. Mx. Loheide, a barista, was living in an apartment in Queens, but said their mental and physical health was deteriorating from a series of maintenance issues that their landlord refused to fix, including a roach infestation, holes in the ceiling, a lack of heat and a broken toilet.“We didn’t feel safe,” Mx. Loheide said.But in the months following, Mx. Loheide, their roommate and their partner applied to five apartments — spending hundreds of dollars on application fees — all of which they were rejected from.“The first rejection was because we didn’t have a third guarantor,” Mx. Loheide said. “I kept asking the brokers ‘why?’ but I barely ever got a real answer.”Eventually, Mx. Loheide felt they had no choice but to stay in their current apartment, even if it meant an emotional toll and more landlord troubles.“We couldn’t move,” Mx. Loheide said. “We kept expanding our budgets and scraping together more to afford to relocate, but what good is that if we can’t even get approved?”Why Landlords Care About Your CreditCredit is one of the tools property owners have to utilize to tell upfront if a tenant will be able to make their rent payments, said Jay Martin, the executive director of the Community Housing Improvement Program, a trade association for 4,000 property managers and owners in New York.“Property owners have a fiduciary duty to figure out that the applicants that they’re screening are going to be able to pay the rent that they are applying for, because they have mortgages that they’ll have to pay with the rent money that they are collecting,” Mr. Martin said.Mr. Martin added that the money from application fees “is not in any way a form of revenue for management companies, brokers or property owners.” The fee, Mr. Martin said, goes toward covering the cost of running the background checks, credit checks and other screening processes.Still, some tactics and motives have drawn criticism.Brokers also may encourage people who will likely get denied from an apartment application to apply anyway, for financial incentives or in hopes of raising their statistics on how many applicants they can bring in, said Felipe Ernst, a faculty member in Georgetown’s masters of real estate program and founder of a D.C.-based real estate development firm.While it can create more competition for an apartment and give a landlord more options to choose from, it can negatively impact potential renters who are already struggling since application fees, which can add up to hundreds of dollars, are almost always nonrefundable, he said.“It’s borderline unethical to put someone in the wringer, knowing that they won’t get approved,” Mr. Ernst said. “But at the same time, you need to have a realistic look on your finances. I don’t go to a Ferrari dealership if I can only buy a Honda.”Vipassana Vijayarangan could not live with her boyfriend as planned because her lack of credit disqualified her from renting an apartment with him.Todd Midler for The New York TimesSettling for a Room or a CouchFor people desperate to rent apartments, they are just searching high and low for somewhere to live.In 2018, Vipassana Vijayarangan had to move to D.C. on short notice for a new job. She stayed in an Airbnb until she had pay stubs for a rental application, and with her partner, she found a suitable two-bedroom apartment to apply to in Washington’s Capitol Hill neighborhood.“I told the agent in an email, ‘I’m very interested in this apartment, but I do not have any credit,’” Ms. Vijayarangan, 31, said. “When I lived in the U.S. on a student visa, I didn’t have — and was not allowed — to get a social security card. So it was impossible for me to even apply for the secured version of a credit card until I had work authorization.”Similar to Mr. Frost’s situation, the broker assured Ms. Vijayarangan that her lack of credit wouldn’t be a problem, but in the end, her application was denied.Ms. Vijayarangan, who now works as a data scientist in New York, eventually rented a room in a rowhouse from an immigrant landlord who understood her situation, she said. But, Ms. Vijayarangan and her partner, an American citizen who had a more established credit history, ended up living apart because he could get approved but she could not. “That could have been the first time that we were living together and building a life together,” she said. “We didn’t get to do that.”Mr. Frost is now the proxy for discouraged Gen Zers, but he is just the latest in the storied tradition of members of congress lamenting the process of finding a secondary residence in D.C. after being elected. Through the years, representatives and senators have opted to split a place with one another or even sleep in their offices to save money.In an interview last week, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, said that she has previously “dealt with very similar issues.”In 2018, just after she was first elected and was set to be the youngest woman to serve in Congress, she told The Times, “I have three months without a salary before I’m a member of Congress. So, how do I get an apartment? Those little things are very real.”Similarly, Representative Mondaire Jones, Democrat of New York, said he also ran up debt when he first ran for office.“This place is not set up for people who are not independently wealthy,” Mr. Jones said. “People here don’t understand wealth inequality because they’ve not experienced it.”Mr. Frost has a budget of less than $2,000 a month. He’s looking for a studio apartment within walking distance of the U.S. Capitol since he does not intend to have a car or a driver to chauffeur him. His geographic hopes have restricted his apartment hunt to a few gentrifying neighborhoods.Unsure when he’ll finally secure a place to live, he plans to continue couch surfing for a few months to save money and find an apartment in one of his desired neighborhoods.“I was very close to taking out a loan, which would mean spending a lot of personal money to pay back the loan,” Mr. Frost said. “Rent problems are not just mine. There are millions of Americans that have these same problems.” More

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      South Africa’s President, Cyril Ramaphosa, Wins Battle to Lead A.N.C.

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      Despite a high-profile scandal, Cyril Ramaphosa was able to secure enough support to stay in control, almost assuring him a second term as the country’s leader after elections scheduled for 2024.JOHANNESBURG — President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa prevailed on Monday in his bid to win a second term as leader of the governing African National Congress, overcoming attacks from within his highly factionalized party and an embarrassing scandal involving the theft of what he said was more than half a million dollars in cash stuffed in a sofa on his farm.Mr. Ramaphosa’s victory, announced during the A.N.C.’s national conference, almost assures him a second term as South Africa’s president after elections scheduled for 2024. The chosen leader of the A.N.C., the party with the most seats in Parliament, has become the nation’s president in every election since 1994.Mr. Ramaphosa received 2,476 votes, while his challenger, Zweli Mkhize, the country’s former health minister, finished far behind with 1,897.While the results were a relief for Mr. Ramaphosa, 70, and his allies after a bruising battle, he will have little time to breathe easy.Lynsey ChutelHe confronts a mountain of challenges, from a government that can barely keep the lights on or protect its residents against crime to a party that has plummeted in popularity from its days as the heroic liberator that unseated the apartheid regime.The A.N.C. is as divided as ever, analysts and even some of its members have said. Some of the conflicts are ideological — like differences over how aggressively the government should move to seize and redistribute land. Yet most of the fights have little to do with policy, A.N.C. officials concede. Rather, they are more about personality, regional and ethnic alliances, and winning positions in government in order to control how public money is spent.“Our experience of recent years is that disunity does not arise from ideological, political or strategic differences amongst us,” Mr. Ramaphosa told delegates during his opening address at the conference on Friday. “But it arises from a contest over positions in the state, and resources that are attached to them.”It remains to be seen whether the party’s leader can hold together the fragile coalition, heal lingering wounds and help the A.N.C. maintain more than 50 percent of the national vote in 2024.“It’s at a crossroads of some sort,” said Mmamoloko Kubayi, a member of the party’s executive committee. She added that this year’s leadership battle was about the survival of the A.N.C. “It should be a watershed in terms of, it changes the posture of the organization and where it’s going.”What to Know About Cyril Ramaphosa and ‘Farmgate’Card 1 of 3Who is Cyril Ramaphosa? More

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      The Ideal of Democracy in a Jewish State Is in Jeopardy

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      Israeli elections can be dramatic, and its five elections within four years have been full of political surprises and firsts, including the first time an independent Israeli Arab party joined a governing coalition. This series of new governments and the sometimes tumultuous process of forming them are part of Israel’s proud tradition as a boisterous and pluralistic democracy.Yet the far-right government that will soon take power, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, marks a qualitative and alarming break with all the other governments in Israel’s 75-year history. While Mr. Netanyahu clearly has the support of the Israeli electorate, his coalition’s victory was narrow and cannot be seen as a broad mandate to make concessions to ultrareligious and ultranationalist parties that are putting the ideal of a democratic Jewish state in jeopardy.This board has been a strong supporter of Israel and a two-state solution for many years, and we remain committed to that support. Antisemitism is on the rise around the globe, and at least some of the criticism of Israel is the result of such hatred.Mr. Netanyahu’s government, however, is a significant threat to the future of Israel — its direction, its security and even the idea of a Jewish homeland. For one, the government’s posture could make it militarily and politically impossible for a two-state solution to ever emerge. Rather than accept this outcome, the Biden administration should do everything it can to express its support for a society governed by equal rights and the rule of law in Israel, as it does in countries all over the world. That would be an act of friendship, consistent with the deep bond between the two nations.Mr. Netanyahu’s comeback as prime minister, a year and a half after he was ousted from office, can’t be divorced from the corruption allegations that have followed him. He is now doing everything he can to stay in power, by catering to the demands of the most extreme elements of Israeli politics. The new cabinet he is forming includes radical far-right parties that have called for, among other things, expanding and legalizing settlements in a way that would effectively render a Palestinian state in the West Bank impossible; changing the status quo on the Temple Mount, an action that risks provoking a new round of Arab-Israeli violence; and undermining the authority of the Israeli Supreme Court, thus freeing the Knesset, the Israeli legislature, to do whatever it wants, with little judicial restraint.Ministers in the new government are set to include figures such as Itamar Ben-Gvir, who was convicted in Israel in 2007 for incitement to racism and supporting a Jewish terrorist organization. He will probably be minister of national security. Bezalel Smotrich, who has long supported outright annexation of the West Bank, is expected to be named the next finance minister, with additional authority over the administration of the West Bank. For the deputy in the prime minister’s office in charge of Jewish identity, Mr. Netanyahu is expected to name Avi Maoz, who once described himself as a “proud homophobe.”These moves are troubling, and America’s leaders should say so. The Biden administration’s main response so far has been a cautious speech by Secretary of State Antony Blinken to the liberal advocacy group J Street on Dec. 4, in which he declared that the United States would deal with Israeli policies, not individuals. The new government has yet to be formed, so it is not surprising that the State Department does not yet have a well-defined position, but the administration has already discussed, according to a report in Axios, how to manage its meetings with the most extreme members of the new cabinet and which core interests to focus on.This approach understates the potential consequences of the shift in Israeli politics that this government represents. The cabinet about to take charge is not simply another iteration of the unstable, shifting alliances that followed the past four inconclusive elections. Those coalitions, like many before them, often included fringe religious or nationalist parties, but they were usually kept in check by more moderate political parties or even by Mr. Netanyahu over the 15 years he served as prime minister.All that is now threatened. Right-wing parties have an absolute majority in the Knesset, and Mr. Netanyahu, hoping that the new government will save him from prosecution and potential prison time, is in their power. Among the targets of the new leaders is the Israeli Supreme Court, which, in the absence of a national constitution, has served to weigh government actions against international law and the Israeli state’s own traditions and values. The nationalists would diminish this authority by voting to give themselves the power to override Supreme Court decisions. Not incidentally, they have also proposed eliminating the law under which Mr. Netanyahu faces a possible prison term.As Thomas L. Friedman, a Times columnist who has closely followed Israeli affairs for four decades, wrote shortly after the election results were known, “We are truly entering a dark tunnel.” While Mr. Netanyahu in the past used the “energy of this illiberal Israeli constituency to win office,” Mr. Friedman wrote, until now, he had never given them this kind of ministerial authority over critical defense and economic portfolios.This is not simply a disappointing turn in an old ally. The relationship between Israel and the United States has long been one that transcends traditional definitions of a military alliance or of diplomatic friendship. A body of deeply shared values has forged powerful and complex bonds. A commitment to Israel, both in its security and in its treatment by the world, has been an unquestioned principle of American foreign and domestic policy for decades, even when Mr. Netanyahu openly defied Barack Obama or embraced Donald Trump. As Mr. Blinken said in his speech, the United States will hold Israel “to the mutual standards we have established in our relationship over the past seven decades.”Israel has been moving steadily rightward in recent years. That is, in part, due to genuine concerns about crime and security, especially after violence between Israeli Arabs and Jews last year. Many Israelis also express fear that the peace process has failed because of a lack of interest in peace among Palestinian leaders, a fear heightened by Hamas control in Gaza since 2007 and a sense that Mahmoud Abbas’s grip on the Palestinian Authority is coming to an end without a clear succession plan.Demographic change in Israel has also shifted the country’s politics. Religious families in Israel tend to have large families and to vote with the right. A recent analysis by the Israel Democracy Institute found that about 60 percent of Jewish Israelis identify as right wing today; among people ages 18 to 24, the number rises to 70 percent. In the Nov. 1 election, the old Labor Party, once the liberal face of Israel’s founders, won only four seats, and the left-wing Meretz won none.Moderating forces in Israeli politics and civil society are already planning energetic resistance to legislation that would curtail the powers of the Israeli Supreme Court or the rights of the Arab minority or the L.G.B.T.Q. community. They deserve support from the American public and from the Biden administration.Whatever the contours of the new Israeli government, the United States will continue to be engaged with it on many issues of shared concern. Negotiations on a new nuclear deal with Iran are all but dead, a situation that poses a threat to security across the region. The Abraham Accords, while not a substitute for peace with the Palestinians, normalized relations between Israel and several Arab nations. That is welcome progress, and the United States could play an important role in helping to expand them to include other countries, such as Saudi Arabia.While Palestinian-Israeli negotiations have long been moribund, the principle of someday achieving two states remains the bedrock of American and Israeli cooperation. Hopes for a Palestinian state have dimmed under the combined pressure of Israeli resistance and Palestinian corruption, ineptitude and internal divisions. Anything that undermines Israel’s democratic ideals — whether outright annexation of Jewish settlements or legalization of illegal settlements and outposts — would undermine the possibility of a two-state solution.America’s support for Israel reflects our two countries’ respect for democratic ideals. President Biden and Mr. Netanyahu should do everything they can to reaffirm that commitment.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: [email protected] The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Once a Figurehead of Change, Ireland’s Returning Leader Has Lots to Prove

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      In Leo Varadkar’s first stint as prime minister, he embodied for many his country’s move into modernity. But after several missteps, he now takes up the role for a second time, with the glow of optimism dimmed.When Leo Varadkar became Ireland’s prime minister in 2017, he was hailed as a fresh face in European politics, only 38 years old, his country’s first openly gay leader and the first with South Asian heritage — a personification of a rapidly modernizing state.Now he returns to office on Saturday, in a prearranged power-sharing deal, with that initial optimism dissipated, and with question marks over his judgment and leadership style.Mr. Varadkar, who trained as a doctor, was one of Europe’s youngest heads of government when he took over from Enda Kenny, then his party’s leader, who had become embroiled in a police whistle-blowing scandal. At the time, many Irish commentators viewed him as a breath of fresh air. He “comes across to the public, especially younger voters, as if he is not a politician at all,” the political columnist Stephen Collins wrote in The Irish Times in 2017.“In this anti-politician phase of Western democracy,” Mr. Collins added, “that is a crucial asset.”Much was expected of Mr. Varadkar as he climbed the ranks. The son of an immigrant — his father, who is also a doctor, is from Mumbai; his mother is an Irish nurse — Mr. Varadkar announced that he was gay in 2015 while serving as health minister. That statement, during a referendum about legalizing gay marriage, was cited by some as having contributed to the measure’s approval.Then, as prime minister, or taoiseach, Mr. Varadkar oversaw another referendum — and another cultural watershed in a country long a stronghold of Roman Catholic doctrine — this time to legalize abortion. That measure, voted on in 2018, was also approved.A crowd in Dublin reacting to the result of the referendum that liberalized the abortion law in 2018. The measure was approved while Mr. Varadkar was taoiseach.Paulo Nunes dos Santos for The New York TimesFor many, Mr. Varadkar, a conservative who had once opposed abortion and allowing gay couples to adopt, was a symbol of Ireland’s transition to a socially liberal, secular nation.But by the time Mr. Varadkar became prime minister, his party, Fine Gael, had already been in power for six years, and he could not shield it from deepening crises in housing, health and education on its watch. In the 2020 election, Fine Gael slumped to third place for the first time in its history and was forced into a coalition with a rival center-right party, Fianna Fail, to hold onto power.The coalition deal demoted Mr. Varadkar to deputy prime minister. Micheal Martin of Fianna Fail took over for the first two and a half years of the usual five-year term; now, Mr. Varadkar gets another chance.So far, his return to power has been marked by little fanfare, and there have been no announcements of major new policies, which would in any case have to be agreed upon with his coalition partners in Fianna Fail, the Green Party and a few independent lawmakers.Critics have pointed to Mr. Varadkar’s stiffness of manner and tendency to speak his mind, to the point of insensitivity, as counting against him in Ireland’s relatively conciliatory political climate.Last month, for example, Mr. Varadkar responded to reports that many young Irish people were thinking of emigrating to escape the housing and cost of living crisis by saying that they should not expect to find cheaper rents abroad.“The grass can look greener, and considering emigration is not the same as actually doing it, and many do come back,” he said in a radio interview.Traditional brick houses in Stoneybatter, a gentrified neighborhood of Dublin. The Irish government’s Central Statistics Office found that 43 percent of renters were thinking of leaving Ireland to find better and cheaper housing abroad.Paulo Nunes dos Santos for The New York TimesThose comments prompted a storm of social media posts from young Irish emigrants reporting that they had indeed found better and cheaper accommodation in major cities abroad. Critics noted that in 2021, Dublin was the most expensive city in the European Union for renting a small house or one-bedroom apartment — higher than Amsterdam, Berlin or Paris — and pointed out that rents in Ireland had increased by another 8.2 percent since then. This month, the government’s Central Statistics Office found that 43 percent of renters were thinking of leaving Ireland to find better and cheaper housing abroad.Lorcan Sirr, a housing policy lecturer at Technological University Dublin, said Mr. Varadkar’s comments portrayed him as out of touch.“The tin ear and lack of sensitivity to other people’s needs is fairly characteristic of his party,” Mr. Sirr noted. “Varadkar has had a fairly privileged housing upbringing in that he didn’t have to suffer the trials and tribulations that many young voters — now including many who would have voted Fine Gael — have to go through to find somewhere to live.”For the past two years, he has also been dogged by questions about the legality and appropriateness of his actions when, as prime minister, he leaked details from a closed negotiation with Ireland’s main doctors’ organization to an acquaintance with an interest in the talks.Without referring to anything in particular, this past week, Mr. Varadkar acknowledged his fallibility. “Everyone makes errors in judgment — you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t,” he told reporters, but he added that he was confident that he had the full support of the coalition.Whether the public is behind him is another question. At the start of this month, an opinion poll found that 43 percent would prefer Mr. Martin to remain Taoiseach. Only 34 percent wanted Mr. Varadkar to take over again. A month before, the two had been tied at 39 percent.Winning the next election, scheduled for 2025, looks to be an uphill battle for Mr. Varadkar. The agreement between his party, Fine Gael, and Fianna Fail — also in long-term decline — was seen as an awkward alliance to check the growing influence of an up and coming rival for power, Sinn Fein.Mr. Varadkar, center, with Micheal Martin of Fianna Fail and Mary Lou McDonald, the Sinn Fein leader, at an election debate in February 2020 in Dublin.Pool photo by Niall CarsonOnce the political wing of the militant Provisional Irish Republican Army, which used violence to try to end British rule in Northern Ireland during the bloody “Troubles” of 1968 to 1998, Sinn Fein has sought to rebrand itself as a democratic force of the center-left. The party vows to solve the housing crisis by abandoning the reliance on private developers and landlords to supply properties, instead spending state money to build 100,000 new homes. That, together with promises to overhaul health and education, have won Sinn Fein considerable support.A Politico poll this month showed voter support for Sinn Fein at 34 percent, with Fine Gael at 23 percent and Fianna Fail at 18 percent. If replicated in an election, that would put the Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald in a strong position to become the first female taoiseach, and also the first from outside the Fine Gael and Fianna Fail political movements since the state was founded a century ago.After being in government in various roles for 11 years, Mr. Varadkar may no longer carry the novelty of being a political outsider, but his supporters say that he is older and wiser and has learned from his mistakes.Gary Murphy, a professor of politics at Dublin City University, said he believed that Mr. Varadkar’s main priority in his second term as prime minister would be to show he can guide his party to the electoral success that has so far eluded him.“In 2017, when he walked home in the party leadership competition, he was being hailed as a generational change,” Professor Murphy said, “but that hasn’t happened.”“He’s young, and he could still have a life outside politics,” Professor Murphy added, “but I don’t think he’ll want to go until he has shown he can do well in an election.” More

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      Tunisia Heads for First Elections Since Presidential Power Grab

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      Voters will choose a new Parliament, but under revised rules that vastly dilute the influence of political parties that many blame for sabotaging the North African nation’s 10-year experiment with democracy.TUNIS — Depending on whom you ask in Tunisia, Saturday’s parliamentary elections — the first since a 2021 presidential power grab that all but killed the country’s young democracy — represent either major progress or a charade.To some, the new electoral law governing the vote is an innovation that will shatter the power of the corrupt political parties that wrecked Tunisia’s economy, subverted justice and made a mockery of the country’s 10-year experiment with democracy. To others, it is the illegitimate brainchild of a president with autocratic aspirations of his own.It may be seen as delivering a group of parliamentarians perceived as far more representative of their districts than previous Tunisian assemblies, or a rubber-stamp chamber that will impose few checks on President Kais Saied’s one-man rule. It might be the next step in Mr. Saied’s plan to clean up corruption and return Tunisia to prosperity and the original goals of the 2011 revolution. Or it is the next stop on the way to looming political and economic ruin.This will be the fourth time that Tunisians have gone to the polls since overthrowing an autocrat in the 2011 revolt, which inspired the Arab Spring uprisings across the region and established the only democracy to emerge from the movement.The elections will resuscitate a body that Mr. Saied suspended in July 2021 in what growing numbers of Tunisians now call a coup, demolishing the young democracy as he began governing by presidential decree. At the time, Tunisians from all classes and regions greeted the moment with cheers and relief, hoping and believing that Mr. Saied would fulfill the revolution’s unmet promises.The president later vowed to restore the assembly as part of a series of sweeping political changes, including the drafting of a new constitution that he personally oversaw, that would put Tunisia back on track.Caught between their misgivings about the president and loathing of the political parties who oppose him, many Tunisians appear lukewarm at best on this vote. The scant interest may partly reflect the fact that Tunisians’ minds are occupied by making ends meet, not politics.But the new Parliament will look little like the one it replaces thanks to Mr. Saied’s new constitution and electoral law, which, among other changes, prevents political parties from being involved in elections. And as the economy has cratered over the past year, more Tunisians are losing faith that Mr. Saied’s project will bring about the changes they are desperate to see.A secondhand clothing stall in front of a poster of President Kais Saied in Kairouan, Tunisia, this summer. The country’s economy has been struggling, with high prices and not enough jobs.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times“What is happening is just a charade,” said Haifa Homri, 24, a law student who went from volunteering for Mr. Saied’s presidential campaign in 2019 to joining an anti-Saied protest of several hundred people in central Tunis last Saturday. “We can’t call them elections,” she added.“I see that the president has made promises,” she said. “But in reality, we can all see the economy is collapsing,” she added, pointing to Tunisia’s grim reality: prices too high, jobs too few, basics such as cooking oil and bottled water scarce on store shelves, and record numbers of people drowning off the coast in a desperate bid to migrate to Europe.Mr. Saied’s new electoral law, which, like all laws since July 2021, was issued by decree, removes from the electoral process the much-despised political parties that constitute some of his only organized opposition.It has voters selecting individual candidates in each district instead of a party list — a change Mr. Saied’s supporters say will buttress democratic accountability by ensuring new members of Parliament know and are known by the people they represent.All political parties are also banned from financing candidates, and there are no longer quotas for female or young candidates, which were instituted after the revolution.Those regulations have raised concerns that, far from becoming more representative of the country, Parliament will fill with men with the means to fund their own campaigns: businessmen, local notables and tribal elders. Of the 1,055 candidates running for 161 seats, just 122 are women.Such rules have led most of the major parties to boycott the elections, as they did the referendum earlier this year in which Tunisians approved Mr. Saied’s new constitution. They say the vote is illegitimate.Yet some analysts warn that sitting out the election risks ceding the entire field to Saied supporters, who include many of the candidates.Without parties to set the agenda and unite members around common causes, the new Parliament is expected to be fractured, chaotic and unproductive, offering few checks on the president’s power.Even an assembly full of political opponents would be largely helpless, as Mr. Saied’s new constitution greatly increases presidential power, reducing Parliament to an advisory role from the main force in government.Tunisians waiting to receive salaries and pensions at a post office in Tunis this summer. The government is struggling to meet a heavy debt burden and pay public salaries, among other economic problems.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York Times“So this is doomed to be a Parliament that is marginalized,” said Youssef Cherif, a political analyst who is the director of the Columbia Global Centers in Tunis. “I think people will now understand more and more that the power is in the hands of the president.”With Mr. Saied as the focus, opposition leaders defending the post-2011, pre-July 2021 order confidently predict that more Tunisians will abandon Mr. Saied as the economy degenerates. But analysts say his failure does not guarantee their success unless they can offer Tunisians a convincing alternative, a challenge for politicians whom Tunisians blame for what they call the “black decade” after the revolution.“Tunisians who are expecting their socioeconomic conditions to improve once Ennahda is pushed out of power and once Saied is able to implement his project — I think they will be disappointed, because things will not improve quickly,” Mr. Cherif said, referring to the Islamist party that dominated Parliament until July 2021.While polls have shown Mr. Saied’s support declining, the opposition parties’ numbers are far worse. Anti-government demonstrations, though growing, remain much smaller than in previous years, something analysts attribute to Mr. Saied’s enduring popularity.Though the major political parties have been stripped of power for nearly a year and a half, Mr. Saied’s supporters say those same parties are conspiring to block his changes.“Political parties are boycotting because these elections will put an end to their corruption,” said Salah Mait, an unemployed man from the capital, Tunis, who said he strongly supported Mr. Saied and his plans. “Their programs were just slogans. They just want to be in power.”Turnout has declined in every election since the revolution as faith in democracy has dwindled. The Chahed Observatory, an elections monitor, said the level of interest in the vote is the lowest in a decade, even below July’s constitutional referendum, when turnout was less than a third.In previous elections, party organizations helped boost turnout and energy. But this time, the self-funded candidates have mounted anemic campaigns, and only one candidate is on the ballot in some districts.And then there is the preoccupation with the flailing economy.Though the government has struck a preliminary deal with the International Monetary Fund for a $1.9 billion loan, economists say it will cover only a small part of the country’s needs. The government is struggling to meet a heavy debt burden, pay public salaries and keep importing basic commodities.A demonstration against Mr. Saied last week in Tunis.Fethi Belaid/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe conditions the government agreed to have drawn the ire of Tunisia’s public-sector labor union, earning Mr. Saied a powerful new opponent over the very issue on which he is most vulnerable.“The country is living through a suffocating situation and deteriorating on every level,” Noureddine Taboubi, the secretary general of the union, said in a speech to members this month. “We are going into elections without color or taste that came from a constitution that was not collaborative, not a result of consensus nor approval by the majority,” he added.“The elections are a charade,” some in the crowd began shouting.The union’s opposition has helped prevent previous Tunisian governments from pushing through the tough changes that the I.M.F. demands, such as selling off publicly owned companies and lifting subsidies on food, gas and electricity.With the economy in free fall, the drumbeat of politically motivated prosecutions and the weakening of civil liberties under Mr. Saied have drawn less attention. But the president remains steadfast against criticism.“Tunisians know that all the work I’m doing is for Tunisians to live with dignity and liberty,” he said while visiting a poor neighborhood in Tunis on Sunday night, going on to criticize the opposition as doing little to improve living conditions when it was in power. “We will stick to the principles we started with, and we will carry on.” More

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      Will the African National Congress Buy President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Alibi?

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      A bizarre scandal threatens to topple President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa from leadership of the African National Congress, which begins its party conference on Friday. Will A.N.C. members buy his astonishing account?JOHANNESBURG — The story begins when a Sudanese businessman landed in the Johannesburg airport two days before Christmas 2019, according to his account, rolling a carry-on suitcase with $600,000 in cash. He said he had wanted to surprise his South African wife for her birthday, and buy a house.Instead, according to Cyril Ramaphosa, the president of South Africa, that cash somehow ended up stashed inside a sofa in the private residence of his game farm.This convoluted story — and whether it is at all credible — is the subject of a scandal that has riveted South Africa and threatened to unseat Mr. Ramaphosa from the presidency. On Friday, his party, the African National Congress, convenes its national conference, held every five years, where some 4,000 delegates will decide whether to elect Mr. Ramaphosa to a second term as their leader. Given the A.N.C.’s dominance of South African politics, the person elected party president has always become South Africa’s president.A protégé of Nelson Mandela, Mr. Ramaphosa, 70, rose to power five years ago carrying hopes that he could save the A.N.C., a once-vaunted liberation movement now facing a reckoning over rampant corruption and a failure to provide basic services.The president’s game farm, Phala Phala Wildlife, where a Sudanese businessman said that, practically on a whim, he bought 20 buffaloes for $580,000. Joao Silva/The New York TimesHis rhetoric about good governance and record as a businessman gave South Africans hope that he would clean house and help the A.N.C. focus on rescuing Africa’s most industrialized economy.But now, much of the country — including opposition lawmakers, political analysts and even some of the president’s allies — can’t help but wonder whether he simply represents the same old corruption of the ruling elite.“Unfortunately, now he’s got that cloud hanging over his head,” said Lindiwe Zulu, a senior A.N.C. official and member of the president’s cabinet who has been supportive of him. Referring to the scandal, she said, “People are going to be asking a question: ‘How on earth do you have something like that being a president?’”The scandal known as Farmgate erupted in June, after Arthur Fraser, South Africa’s former spy chief and a political opponent of Mr. Ramaphosa, filed a criminal complaint accusing him of failing to report to the police the theft of at least $4 million from the president’s farm.What to Know About Cyril Ramaphosa and ‘Farmgate’Card 1 of 3Who is Cyril Ramaphosa? More

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      Protesters in Peru Demand Justice for Ousted President Pedro Castillo

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      Eight days after Pedro Castillo’s removal from office and arrest, thousands of his supporters have joined protests demanding his reinstatement. To them, he is the voice of the marginalized.LIMA, Peru — Outside a detention center at the foot of the Andes Mountains, a camp has formed in recent days, with as many as 1,000 people traveling hundreds of miles to demand freedom for the highest-profile detainee: their former president, Pedro Castillo.They will stay until he is reinstated, said one supporter, Milagros Rodriguez, 37, or until “civil war begins.”Mr. Castillo, a former schoolteacher and union activist who promised to fight for the poor, is the man at the center of Peru’s dizzying political drama, having been removed from office last week after he tried to dissolve Congress and create a government that would rule by decree. Within hours he was under arrest, accused of rebellion, and his vice president was sworn into office.Now, Dina Boluarte is the sixth president in five years in a country reeling from a long history of high-level scandals and deep divisions between its rural poor and urban elite.During a virtual court hearing televised live on Thursday, a judge ordered Mr. Castillo be kept in pretrial detention for 18 months while his case proceeds. Mr. Castillo refused to appear at the hearing.What started out as a relatively peaceful transfer of power has quickly erupted into widespread violence that has left at least 16 dead, many of them teenagers, and led to attacks against police stations, courthouses, factories, airports and a military base.Protesters outside the detention center on Thursday.Marco Garro for The New York TimesAt least 197 civilians and more than 200 police officers have been injured in clashes, according to the country’s ombudsman’s office, which in a statement Thursday called on security forces to “immediately cease the use of firearms and tear gas bombs dropped from helicopters.”The government has responded to the unrest by imposing a national state of emergency, suspending the guarantee of many civil liberties, including the freedom of assembly. In an effort to quell the unrest, the new president has called for early elections, for as soon as December 2023, a move that Congress is debating.Ms. Boluarte, a former ally of Mr. Castillo, has found herself increasingly at odds with the rural Peruvians who voted the two of them into office last year. On Thursday, her government expanded the state of emergency, imposing a curfew in 15 provinces.What to Know About the Ousting of Peru’s PresidentCard 1 of 4Who is Pedro Castillo? More

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      Your Thursday Briefing: China’s Snarled Covid Data

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      Plus France just beat Morocco to advance to the World Cup finals.“The statistics are meaningless,” an expert said.Aly Song/ReutersChina’s ‘meaningless’ Covid dataDespite repeated assurances that the country’s rollback of restrictions is under control, China has no clear picture of its Covid-19 infections.Even the most basic question of how many people are infected is hard to answer: China has relaxed mass testing requirements and made reporting at-home test results voluntary. Yesterday, the government said it would stop reporting asymptomatic infections, which made up most of the positive test results in the past.The country’s official data around Covid may be hazy, but there’s strong anecdotal evidence of a surging number of cases. Hospitals, too, are crowded.The lack of reliable information could have major economic implications. Foreign businesses and investors don’t know how long it will take for China’s economy to recover. And shoppers are still hesitant to re-enter stores and restaurants after years of enforced lockdowns.From Opinion: Abandoning “zero Covid” is a chance for President Xi Jinping to pivot from the perils of one-man rule, Minxin Pei argues.Other China news: Beijing will withdraw six diplomats from the U.K. following a British police inquiry into a violent clash at a demonstration at the Chinese Consulate in Manchester.Morocco supporters celebrated in Paris when the team beat Portugal to reach the semifinals.Christophe Petit Tesson/EPA, via ShutterstockFrance beats Morocco, 2-0France beat Morocco just minutes before we sent out this newsletter. The team will play Argentina on Sunday in the World Cup final.The first half of the game ended with France in the lead, 1-0. Morocco held firm, avoiding a complete disaster. Its magical run has elated fans: It was the first Arab or African team to reach the semifinals. France surged in the second half, when it scored another goal.Understand the Situation in ChinaBeijing’s restrictive “zero Covid” policy pummeled China’s economy and set off mass protests that were a rare challenge to the Communist leadership.A Messy Pivot: The Communist Party cast aside many Covid rules after the protests, while playing down the threat of the virus. The move could prove dangerous.In Beijing: As a wave of Covid sweeps across the Chinese capital, Beijing looks like a city in the throes of a lockdown — this time, self-imposed by residents.Importance of Vaccines: As the government drops its restrictions, it not only needs to convince people that the virus is nothing to fear, but also that inoculations are essential.Fearing a Grim Future: Even as China eases its Covid rules, the outlook for many young people remains gloomy, with few job prospects and high unemployment rates.The match was always about more than sports. France ran a protectorate in Morocco from 1912 to 1956, when Morocco gained independence. Many Moroccans in France still face racism and other forms of discrimination, and diplomatic ties remain complex.Now, despite its loss, Morocco has become the champion of the world’s colonized against the world’s colonizers­. Details: Morocco’s team had the most nonnative-born players in the World Cup. Fourteen grew up in Europe yet chose to play for Morocco. Some said they made the choice because of the bigotry they had faced in Europe.From Opinion:Before Morocco’s loss, Issandr El Amrani said he hadn’t seen such optimism in the Arab world since the 2011 uprisings.France’s team, full of players with roots in the former colonies, offers hope for the country’s future, Laurent Dubois writes.Fiji’s vote count is expected to take two days.Saeed Khan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFiji’s closely watched electionFijians voted in a general election yesterday. The outcome could have major regional implications: The island nation has recently taken on outsize importance in the battle for Pacific influence between the U.S. and China.Under Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama, the prime minister, Fiji has grown closer to China. His challenger, Sitiveni Rabuka, recently indicated that he would prefer closer ties to Australia, a longtime ally of Fiji that is also trying to strengthen its influence in the Pacific.The contest could become volatile. Both men have been involved in coups: Bainimarama led Fiji’s last one, in 2006; Rabuka its first, in 1987. It remains unclear if Bainimarama would honor the results, were he to lose. Experts said that he could seek the help of Fiji’s military, which is constitutionally permitted to intervene if it sees fit.Analysis: Turnout was low. “With the two likely contenders for prime minister being former coup leaders, it may be that people think, ‘Is it really democracy?’” an expert said.In other Pacific news: Australia signed a new security deal with Vanuatu, The Associated Press reports.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificNew Zealand enacted a lifetime prohibition on cigarette sales to everyone born after 2008.Jason Oxenham/Getty ImagesNew Zealand’s new laws are aimed at eliminating most smoking by 2025, following more than a decade of public health campaigns.The Australian police are investigating the potential influence of far-right extremism in a Queensland shooting, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.The U.S. created a space force unit in South Korea, The Associated Press reports. It is likely to be used to monitor the North.The Group of 7 countries will give Vietnam $15.5 billion to help it shift toward renewable energy, Asia Financial reports.The War in UkraineMarco Hernandez and Josh Holder/The New York Times; Planet LabsRussia is building a vast network of trenches and traps in an effort to slow Ukraine’s advance.The U.S. is poised to send Ukraine the Patriot, its most advanced ground-based air defense system.Paul Whelan, an American detained in Russia, has no clear path to release.Around the WorldPeru said it would declare a state of emergency. Violent protests are raging days after its president was ousted.Iran was ousted from the U.N. Women’s Rights Agency as protests continue.President Biden vowed to expand the U.S.’s involvement in Africa yesterday in a speech to nearly 50 heads of state.Floods killed at least 141 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo.Other Big StoriesElon Musk stopped paying rent on Twitter’s offices and disbanded a trust and safety council to cut costs.Biden signed a bipartisan bill protecting same-sex marriages in the U.S.A U.S. prosecutor described Sam Bankman-Fried’s dealings at FTX as “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.” DealBook explains.Brain implants have begun to restore bodily functions. But significant advances are probably decades away.OpinionsIsrael is about to have an extreme right-wing government. Palestinians will pay the price, Diana Buttu writes.Lev Golinkin asks: Why do Harvard, Stanford and NASA still honor Alfried Krupp, a Nazi war criminal?Conservation campaigns centered around individual species known as “spectacles of extinction” can distract from the larger biodiversity crisis, Michelle Nijhuis argues.A Morning ReadGomi, left, and Songkang are white Pungsans, a breed indigenous to North Korea.Chun Jung-in/Yonhap, via Associated PressIn 2018, Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, gave two dogs to South Korea, then led by Moon Jae-in, as a symbol of peace.Four years later, South Korea is in political gridlock and the period of rapprochement on the Korean Peninsula is over. And the two pups, orphaned after a heated dispute over who would pay for their care, ended up in a zoo.PROFILEA Russian artist dissentsVladimir Ovchinnikov, 84, has long painted pastoral scenes across the walls of Borovsk, his provincial hometown, near Moscow.Now, his political art is attracting attention. At a time when dissent is being crushed across Russia, Ovchinnikov has been painting murals protesting the invasion of Ukraine. His own history drove him to denounce violence and war — he did not meet his father until age 11 because his father had spent 10 years in a gulag, and his grandfather and uncle were killed by the state.His work has earned him a reputation as the “Banksy of Borovsk” — which, he said, he does not appreciate. Unlike Banksy, the mysterious street artist based in Britain, Ovchinnikov works in the open. He thinks that his age and his family history offer him a modicum of protection. Still, he has been fined, questioned and pelted with snowballs.“I draw doves, they paint over them,” he said.Banksy: Last month, the artist painted seven murals in and around Kyiv. An activist incited controversy when he removed one of Banksy’s works, saying he intended to auction it off and donate the proceeds to Ukraine’s army.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookJoel Goldberg for The New York TimesThis recipe is for a classic, unadorned latke. (Hanukkah starts on Sunday.)What to Read“The Tatami Galaxy” is a flamboyant vision of college life in Kyoto, Japan, full of obsessive subcultures.What to Watch“Blanquita” explores a sex scandal that sent waves throughout Chile in the early 2000s.Ask WellWhy do men sprout hair in weird places as they age?Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Gold bar (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. Jimmy Carter announced that the U.S. and China would establish diplomatic relations 44 years ago today. In doing so, he severed America’s link with Taiwan.“The Daily” is on abortion in the U.S.You can reach Amelia and the team at [email protected]. More