Critics of incumbent Kais Saied say he has increasingly bent the country’s institutions to his will
Tunisia’s president, Kais Saied, has accused civil society and opposition groups critical of his leadership of being puppets of foreign countries.Tunisia’s president, Kais Saied, has accused civil society and opposition groups critical of his leadership of being puppets of foreign countries.
Last year, he ordered a crackdown on undocumented black migrants that drew criticism from around the world, but the EU nevertheless proceeded with a €105m deal with Tunisia to stem irregular migration.In the run-up to the election, the Independent High Authority for Elections whittled down an initial longlist of 17 presidential candidates to three after a raft of controversial disqualifications.
Sarah Yerkes, a senior fellow in the Middle East programme at the Washington-based thinktank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the election would “almost certainly be a low point in the trajectory of what was once the sole democracy in the Arab world”. Saied’s pursuit of an authoritarian agenda has coincided with downturn in Tunisia’s economic fortunes. Unemployment has risen and inflation is in double digits. According to the World Bank, the country’s economic recovery from years of a cost-of-living crisis and a recession in 2023 has slowed.
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