Tunisia: Opposition party politicians go on hunger strike in prison
Two protests have been staged in Tunisia against the rule of Kais Saied and demanding that opposition politicians be released from prison as they begin a hunger strike.
According to Saudi news agency Asharq Al-Awsat, six detained figures from the opposition Free Constitutional Party have held a hunger strike in light of their impending trial.
The politicians, who include leader Abir Moussi, were arrested on conspiarcy charges in 2023.
Abdelhamid Jelassi, Jawhar Ben Mbarek, Khiyam Turki, Ridha Belhaj, Issam Chebbi and Ghazi Chaouachi were all detained in 2023 during a crackdown on opposition politicians from a number of parties.
Saied described the politicians as “traitors and terrorists” at the moment of their arrest and later added that judges who were to acquit them were accomplices.
Most high-profile politicians are not in prison including the most prominent political opponents of Saied, Abir Moussi and Rached Ghannouchi, who is the head of the Ennahada party.
Moussi began her own hunger strike in February of this year after being arrested for calling for the election in Tunisia in October 2024.
Her lawyers released a statement saying that: “Our client informed us that she no longer feels safe regarding her health or life and that she has officially begun an indefinite hunger strike from today, Wednesday, in protest against ill-treatment.”
Despite the large scale incarceration of opposition politicians, the hunger strikes and the protests on the streets, the Tunisian government insists that there is democracy in the country and that Saied is not a dictator, instead he demands that a corrupt elite must be held to account.
Saied stormed to a landslide victory during last October’s elections, winning 91% of the electorate with only 29% of the population turning out to vote.
In the run up to the election, one of the three presidential candidates on offer, Ayachi Zammel, was arrested on “suspicion of falsifying voter forms”.
As one person told reporters during these latest protests, “what is happening is true tyranny, no freedom for the opposition, no freedom for the media. Any word can you to prison.”
Asharq Al-Awsat, Maghrebi
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