In Tunisia, many knew that his arrest would only be a matter of time, given that he had long since been targeted by President Kais Saied. Ever since, on July 25, 2021, Saied decided to suspend the work of that parliament of which Ghannouchi was the president. The president and historical leader of the Tunisian Islamic party Ennahda, Rached Ghannouchi82, was arrested on the evening of April 17 by order of the anti-terrorism prosecution and is currently in custody at the Aouina police station for questioning.
A decision, that of the arrest of a leader of political Islam of the caliber of Ghannouchiwhich makes it even more pronounced breakthrough accentratrice and hyper presidentialist of Said sanctioned by the new Constitution approved with a referendum last July which canceled the fundamental law approved in 2014, after the Jasmine Revolution. And that completely cancels any form of opposition making a key country even more unstable for the emergency migrants. It is from the Tunisian coasts that most of the boats depart refugees on the route of Mediterranean central which has Italy as its point of arrival, and which are likely to increase enormously if the country’s political situation were to degenerate. To complicate the quadrothe delicate negotiation underway with the International Monetary Fund for 1.9 billion dollars in aid exacerbated by the tone of the same Said who spoke of “diktat from abroad” closing at reforms requests as a condition for obtaining the fund loan.
According to local radio Fm mosaic, Ghannouchi will be questioned about the content of a video released on the net a few days ago, while together with some members of the National Salvation Frontthe main coalition in opposition to the president Said, stated that “the Tunisia without political Islam it is a project of civil war”. More precisely “any attempt to eliminate one of the components policies can only lead to civil war.” Words that had triggered harsh reactions against the media and among supporters of Said and which evidently convinced the investigators to act quickly, even on the basis of anti-terrorism law. In Tunisia it applies state of emergency in addition to a law antifake news which provides for imprisonment up to 5 years for those who spread false news in order to “undermine the rights of others, public order, national defense or sow panic among the population”. Meanwhile Ennahda she asked immediate release of its leader and “the end of the attacks against the political activists of the opposition”.
Ghannouchicharismatic figure of Tunisian political Islam, returned to Tunisia in 2011, after an exile lasting about twenty years, he was the subject of several investigations by the counter-terrorism prosecution, investigations started after the takeover of Kais Saiedyes Ghannouchi immediately defined as a “coup d’état”. Interrogated several times in the last two years on suspicions of illicit financing a Ennahda and for facilitating the sending of Tunisian jihadists in the past Syria, Libya e Iraq to support the militants of the Islamic state, Ghannouchi but he had always managed to come home a free man. A feat that many of his party mates failed, first of all the number two of the Islamic party and former prime minister Ali Laarayedstill in prison since December 2022. But how Laarayed a dozen high grades of Ennhadha are in prison or under investigation. The National Salvation Front for some time he has been denouncing an instrumental use of the judiciary, also “reformed” by Said last year and invokes the intervention of international humanitarian organizations for the release of about twenty politicians, journalists, trade unionists imprisoned on the orders of the president. The arrest of Ghannouchi it certainly deals a fatal blow to the weak opposition to the president.