One-day presidency : how far can one go ?

If you ask people if they would like to be a president for one day, most of them would probably answer : 'Heck yeah !'. However, if you were to further the conversation to what one would do if this wish came to life, the answer would be around the lines of 'I don't know .. '.

So what can one accomplish in a one-day presidency ? Spoiler alert : not much !

You see, being a president is not just about The President. Well, to a certain extent, it is. But there is an entire institution behind the commander-in-chief, a.k.a the office of the presidency. And it would not be reasonable to expect from a president, who is at the end of the day, a human being, radical changes or some revolutionary decisions that would change the course of the country in a single day. 

In fact, change at a macroscopic level, like that of a country, needs time to take effect and show its results. Because every country is a complex system where different components ( such as public administrations, civil society, private sector, labor unions and what have you ) interact and affect the functioning of each other. Hence the 'delay' that change would take to show its effects.

Now with that being said, it is not like a one-day presidency is utterly useless. As a matter of fact, I believe that there is one thing in particular that could have an impact, especially in the case of my country, Tunisia. 

So what would that be ? Calling for a general referendum to ask the people, who is the legitimate source of power, whether they, the people, are satisfied with the current political regime. You see, more than 10 years after the Arab Spring, we as a society have hit a level of disappointment in the 'ruling class' that is no longer sustainable. 

That is not say that we have not accomplished anything since a certain January 14th. Because we definitely did. Democracy-wise, I am proud to say that we are able to set the example for the Arab World to follow. However, democracy can not sustain itself without economic prosperity. Especially that Tunisian youth represent a generation that has a lot to contribute in today's digital economy. Contributions that older generations, with all the respect we owe, can not even begin to imagine.

Okay, I got a bit sidetracked there ! Back to our referendum then. My point is that our political elite got comfortable with all the praise we received for entrenching Democracy into our lives. With that, the actual day-to-day needs of citizens, which can be summarized in their right for economic prosperity, has been relegated to the background. A call for referendum would be a wake-up call, albeit a brutal kind of calls, for the ruling class telling them that the people who overthrew a regime that governed for a quarter of a century, can just as easily do the same for them. And trust me, next time no wrong-doer will be spared.

If I were a president for a single day, that is what I would do. But what do I know, I am just a guy on the internet.