Another Tunisian opposition leader starts hunger strike in jail

The standoff between Tunisian President Kais Saied and his jailed opponents is escalating, after it was announced that a third opposition leader, Rached Ghannouchi, started a hunger strike to shed light on his “unjust imprisonment” and poor jail conditions, according to Reuters on November 8th.

Ghannouchi is the leader of the Islamist Ennahda Party, which was the main opposition to Saied’s authoritarian rule. He is joining two other political leaders in their hunger strike in a bid to put pressure on the Tunisian government. President Saied has been continuously attacking his opposition with unfair charges and imprisonment, which they say have turned Tunisia into an “open-air prison”.

Jawhar Ben Mbarek was the first member of the opposition to start this recent wave of hunger strikes on October 29th, and he was later joined by Issam Chebbi, the Republican Party leader, on November 7th to demand their immediate release on the basis of “unjust imprisonment”.

In April 2025, multiple opponents were given exceedingly long sentences, with some reaching 66 years, under the guise of “conspiracy against state security”. Ben Mbarek reportedly received an 18-year-long sentence for also “belonging to a terrorist organisation”.

Ghannouchi was arrested in 2023 and later given a 37-year sentence for “illicit foreign financing and conspiracy against the state”  in April 2025. The politician refused to appear before the court to denounce Kais Saied’s usurpation of the judiciary to enforce his repressive policies.

The independence of Tunisia’s judicial branch has been greatly undermined by Saied. Judges also organised a hunger strike in July 2022 to denounce the President’s cleansing of judges from the system based on corruption, according to reports.

One of the first hunger strikes took place in September 2023 by Ghannouchi, who was later joined by five other politicians, including Ben Mbarek, to protest their unlawful detention since early 2023, according to the Anadolu Agency.

Ghannouchi was reportedly on a hunger strike in February 2024, and Ben Mbarek also started multiple ones with the latest being this year in April 2025, according to Al Jazeera. Multiple opponents also participated in a hunger strike earlier this year, with the most prominent one being Abir Moussi, who is a strong critic of the Tunisian president.

Relatives, rights groups and attorneys say that the health of Ben Mbarek is deteriorating, as he is at risk of death for continuing his latest strike and refusing treatment.

However, the Tunisian Prisons Authority refuted the claims that the opponents’ health was deteriorating because of their hunger strikes, by saying that medical examinations proved that they were in a “stable and normal” state.

Opponents of the Tunisian president claim they have faced growing repression ever since Saied’s rule by decree, which his opposition considers a coup. Presidential elections were set for October 2024 and were seen as a way to check Saied’s power grab, but the opposition didn’t gather the results they had hoped for.

Under the influence of Saied, revised eligibility rules and the imprisonment of popular candidates were carried out, which heavily favoured the incumbent’s campaign to remain in his position, according to Al Jazeera.

Another crackdown has targeted the country’s rights groups and investigative media, with several suspended for one month under what authorities say is a financial audit.

The affected groups said this measure was unjustified and connected their suspension to Saied’s crackdown on his opposition, as multiple of these groups have reported on human rights violations and his abuses of power. Tunisian authorities are apparently looking for evidence of foreign funding and interference, which might indicate “conspiracy against the state” and interference with internal affairs.

Amnesty International has documented Tunisia’s democratic backsliding and the abuses of Kais Saied’s authoritarian government. Freedom of expression and freedom of the press have sharply declined, and Tunisian authorities killed hundreds of sub-Saharan migrants and were extremely violent to thousands more, who are transitioning through the country in hopes of reaching the EU.

The attacks on civil society and on the opposition were also reported by the NGO, which states that everyone is being targeted, even poor Tunisians who are protesting against the government’s inaction during the socio-economic crisis.

Reuters, The New Arab, Anadolu Agency, Arab News via AFP, Al Jazeera, Amnesty International, Maghrebi.org