Tunisia, 2011 - David Rovics

Mohamed had a vegetable stand, this was his family’s plight

Ever since his father died on a construction site

He was one of six siblings and now this would be his fate

Working the streets of the city to put food on everybody’s plate

He couldn’t afford the bribes the cops would make him pay

So sometimes they’d knock his cart over and get him back that way

Last December they smashed his scales to put him in his place

And then for good measure a cop spat in Mohamed’s face

He went to see the governor, maybe there was something he could do

Word came from on high -- we don’t talk to people like you

Mohamed Bouazizi now was living on a wire

He went and bought some paint thinner and he set himself on fire

Word spread through the region and soon you’d hear the same

Of proud and desperate people going up in flame

Sometimes windows open, sometimes the floor, it creaks

But no one knew what would happen in only a few weeks

When the dictator ran away

People tried to hold a march for the immolated dead

Police met them there with truncheons and bullets to the head

People headed to the capital, they would not be deterred

Sometimes this is just what happens to a dream deferred

The police kept up the attack -- thousands wounded, hundreds killed

With blood the streets were covered, with gas the air was filled

But the people held their ground -- Tunisia’s daughters and their sons

And one day the cops had had enough -- they just put down their guns

When the dictator ran away

Now someone had to deal with this rebellious riffraff

So Ben Ali called a meeting of his chiefs of staff

He said these terrorists have decided to go out on the attack

It’s time for you, the Army, to take our country back

It’s time for you, the Army, to go and make a stand

Show these terrorists that we are in command

It’s time to gun these criminals down -- that’s what he said, now go

The general got his orders and the general said no

When the dictator ran away

Ben Ali got in a plane, tried to go to France

But he was a hot potato so he did a little dance

Ended up in Jidda to live there in exile

While his fellow warlords shiver from the Tigris to the Nile

All across Arabia you can hear them talk and sing

Those who’d dare throw off their shackles, who would shout «let freedom ring»

Where we’ll be by next year is for anyone to say

But many will recall where they were on the day

When the dictator ran away