Tunisia Live

13/05/2017

Several thousand Tunisians marched through central Tunis on Saturday to protest against a bill that would grant amnesty to businessmen accused of corruption when autocrat Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali was in power.

11/05/2017

"Not every businessman is corrupt. But what kind of signal are you giving to everyone else by handing amnesty to a few?"

After facing challenges in getting it through the parliament, as well as protests, the Tunisian government goes after media reporting on a draft bill that pardons corrupt regime officials and businessmen if they return some of the looted money.

11/05/2017

"Previously unheard audio shows Italian authorities telling the sinking migrants to 'call Malta' - despite there being an Italian naval vessel just a few miles away"

Horrific phone calls which reveal how the Italian Coast Guard let dozens of refugees drown in the Mediterranean Sea in 2013, have been obtained by an Italian newspaper.  In previously unheard audio, Italian authorities tell a caller from the sinking refugee ship to "call Malta," despite an Italian N...

11/05/2017

"This means working toward the evolution of the current political consensus based on a gentlemen’s agreement that aims to break the cycle of political polarisation between Islamists and non-Islamists – but which in effect has often resulted in a clientelist redistribution of state resources – to reach a genuine social and regional contract that can shield the country from an upsurge in violence and a return to dictatorship."

Corruption and clientelism are undermining democratic transition in Tunisia, a unique success story after the 2011 Arab uprisings. To put the country back on track, the government should launch a national economic dialogue including established business elites and emerging provincial business leader...

05/05/2017

Recent public hearings of Tunisia’s Truth and Dignity Commission (TDC) saw a painful period of collective introspection for the country’s people. Tales of humiliations, torture, and r**e committed over a near-60 year period—starting at around the time of Tunisia’s independence from France—were broad...

05/05/2017

From the day he held office, Neji Jalloul, the former Tunisian education minister had a very precise (and one he thought to be clever) strategy for how he intended to run his ministry. Apart from the alarming needs of the Tunisian education system, Jalloul’s political aims were synonymous to that of...

27/04/2017

I am going home to Tunisia this summer and the first thing I will be doing is become an organ donor. If you haven’t thought about it yet, now is a good time to do so. According to the National Center of Organ Transplantation Promotion (CNPTO), 80% of Tunisian families refuse donating the organs of

07/04/2017

Dax J has decided to cancel his date in Lyon this Friday, April 7, for fear of being extradited to Tunisia

A British DJ was sentenced to one year in prison in Tunisia after he remixed a call to prayer in one of his songs during a music festival. The nightclub in the coastal town of Hammamet where the incident took place was immediately shut down after videos of the event appeared on Facebook. Many Tunisi...

30/03/2017

Postcolonialism is the last stage in the process of colonialism. However, it is also the longest one. Although postcolonialism seems to be a liberating phase for previously colonized societies, it is actually nothing but a transition into another era of colonialism known as neocolonialism. Postcolon...

29/03/2017

The Tunisian parliament will soon start debating a new set of laws regarding violence against women, proposed by the Ministry of women’s affairs. Honestly, I am neither excited nor delighted. Not only because it is shameful that in 2017, we still don’t have a solid legal framework to protect women a...

09/03/2017

Tunisair, the flag carrier airline of Tunisia, announced the withholding of all of its flights until further notice starting from today. This announcement followed the dispute between crew members of the flight 716 to Paris, and the technical staff. The airplane was scheduled to take off at 8:35 thi...