Mass trial hands down lengthy sentences to Tunisian opposition figures

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A Tunisian court has handed down jail sentences ranging from 13 to 66 years following the trial of 40 opposition politicians and other critics of Kais Saied, the authoritarian president, according to TAP, the country’s official news agency.

The mass trial on broad conspiracy charges is the biggest case against Saied’s opponents since he staged a power grab in 2021 and set about dismantling the democratic system under which he was first elected president in 2019.

Until 2021, Tunisia was seen as the only example of a successful democratic transition among Arab countries that rose up against dictatorship in 2011.

But Saied, a populist who made no secret of his disdain for democracy, dissolved the elected parliament in 2022 and rewrote the constitution to replace it with a toothless assembly unable to challenge his monopoly on power.

The defendants include dissenters with a range of political hues, from Islamists to liberals. Many, including democracy activist Khayyam Turki and opposition politicians Ghazi Chaouachi and Issam Chebbi, have been detained for more than two years. Some of those sentenced had been trying to unite the opposition to peacefully resist Saied’s destruction of Tunisia’s fledgling democracy.

Around half of those convicted were tried in absentia because they had fled the country before arrest. The sentences can be appealed.

Saied had repeatedly described his jailed critics as traitors who were pursuing a foreign agenda.

“The trial is part of the authoritarian drift under Saied and of his attempts to suggest that the country is under some external siege by foreigners and that only he can save Tunisia,” said Riccardo Fabiani, north Africa director at the International Crisis Group.

Dalila Ben Mbarek, a lawyer for the jailed politicians whose brother Jaouhar, a democracy activist, is among those sentenced, said the trial lacked any semblance of justice. It was rushed, the defendants were not present and defence lawyers were denied the right to be heard by the court, she said. “We knew the court decision was prepared in advance and that neither the law nor the judiciary had anything to do with [it].”

Most leaders of political parties in Tunisia have been imprisoned, including Rached Ghannouchi, the head of Nahda, the moderate Islamist party which formed the largest bloc in the disbanded parliament.

Saied has also staged crackdowns against lawyers, journalists and business figures.

“These individuals have been convicted solely for the peaceful exercise of their human rights,” said Erika Guevara Rosas, Senior Director for Research, Policy, Advocacy and Campaigns at Amnesty International. “Their trial has been riddled with procedural violations and a blatant disregard of minimum defence rights and was based on unsubstantiated charges.”