After President Said fired more officials, Tunisia further fell into political uncertainty. A few days before, the President of Tunisia fired the prime minister, suspended parliamentary activities, and the president temporarily led the executive branch.
After suspending parliamentary activities and firing Prime Minister Mehihi last Sunday, he fired the Minister of Defense and the Minister of Justice a day later. After that, Said ordered the firing of a number of senior officials late on Tuesday.
The 63-year-old president was previously a law lecturer and a newcomer to politics. He won the 2019 presidential election by a landslide. He issued a decree to fire a long list of senior government officials, including the chief prosecutor of the army. .
On Wednesday, Said fired the chief executive of Wataniya, the national television channel.
In addition, he also abolished the legislator’s parliamentary immunity and assumed judicial power. At the same time, he also ordered investigations into three political parties suspected of receiving foreign funds before the 2019 general election.
Major civil society groups warned in a joint statement that Said would make any “illegal” extension of the 30-day suspension of parliamentary activities and demanded a timetable for political action.
Tunisian journalist Sam Kimball told Al Jazeera that Said claimed to have plundered nearly US$5 billion from Tunisia through various means.
Kimball said, “He claims to have a list of hundreds of people accused of plundering the country’s wealth-these people are mainly politicians and members of Congress, and he revoked their immunity on Sunday night.”
“He (Said) said that this country is not a beggar country and deserves a better future.”
Kimball said that the president’s actions appeared to be “to appease those who might be skeptical of his extreme measures taken in the past few days”.
The President stated that according to the constitution, his actions were legitimate. The Tunisian constitution stipulates that the head of state is allowed to take unspecified special measures in case of “imminent threat”.
In addition to political turmoil, the North African country is also threatened by a severe economic crisis — including soaring inflation and high unemployment — and a surge in confirmed cases of new crown pneumonia.
Judicial investigation
The Baath Party-as the largest faction in the coalition government-initially called the seizure of power a “coup”, while major countries such as the United States and the European Union expressed strong concerns.
As tensions increased, the Tunisian Prosecutor’s Office announced on Wednesday that the judiciary had begun investigating allegations that the Baath Party and two other parties had obtained illegal funds before the 2019 elections.
Prosecutor’s spokesperson Mohsen Dali said that the Ministry of Justice’s financial department began an investigation on July 14, focusing on “foreign financing and accepting funds from unknown sources”.
Said is a scholar who has said that he is determined to completely change the political system by amending the law. He also said that he will obtain administrative power with the help of the government, and he will appoint himself as the new head.
The political scientist Slakheddin Djurchi said, “President Said will be very cautious in choosing the future head of government, because he wants a trustworthy and loyal person, and this person will adopt the same policies as him.”
This young democracy is often considered the only successful case of the Arab Spring, and the revolution that began in Tunisia at the end of 2010 swept the region.
Ten years later, many people in this country of 12 million people say that their living standards have hardly improved, and are angry at the political deadlock caused by prolonged infighting among elites.
The dismissed government has also been criticized for its response to the new crown pandemic, which has caused nearly 579,000 diagnoses and more than 19,000 deaths in Tunisia.
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