A Tunisian court has sentenced multiple defendants, including prominent opposition figures, to prison terms ranging from 13 to 66 years for alleged national security offences, according to local media reports on Saturday.
The trial, involving around 40 individuals with many of them vocal critics of President Kais Saied, has been condemned by rights groups and described by one defence lawyer as a “masquerade”.
The opposition defendants, including Ghazi Chaouachi, Issam Chebbi, Jawahar Ben M’Barek, Abdelhamid Jlassi, Ridha Belhaj, and Khayem Turki, have been in custody since their arrest in 2023.
Speaking ahead of the ruling on Friday, defence lawyer Ahmed Souab, who represents several of the accused, criticised the proceedings.
“In my entire life, I have never witnessed a trial like this. It’s a farce, the rulings are ready, and what is happening is scandalous and shameful,” he said.
Tunisian President Kais Saied
Rights groups have accused President Kais Saied of consolidating full control over the judiciary since he dissolved parliament in 2021 and began ruling by decree. In 2022, he dismantled the independent Supreme Judicial Council and dismissed dozens of judges.
TAP, the state news agency, a judicial official confirmed that the sentences ranged from 13 to 66 years, but did not provide further details regarding the specific charges or the individual sentences handed down to each defendant.
Further, Tunisian authorities claim the defendants, among them former officials and former intelligence chief Kamel Guizani, were involved in a plot to destabilize the country and overthrow President Kais Saied.
However, opposition politicians have claimed that authorities want to criminalise the opposition.
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President Denies Being a Dictator
President Kais Saied has consistently denied accusations of authoritarianism, insisting his actions are aimed at restoring order and combating corruption. In 2023, he described opposition politicians as “traitors and terrorists”, going as far as to claim that any judge who might acquit them would be complicit in their actions.
The opposition leaders, however, say the charges are fabricated and politically motivated. They accuse Saied of staging a coup in 2021 to derail Tunisia’s democratic progress.
Further, they said that they were preparing an initiative aimed at uniting the fragmented opposition to face the democratic setback in the cradle of the Arab Spring uprisings.
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Who is Kais Saied?
He is a Tunisian law professor and politician who has been serving as the Tunisia President since 2019.
However, under Saied’s government discontent arouse over his perceived authoritarian style of governance.
Over the years, Saied has rejected the criticism, saying he is fighting a “corrupt elite” and “traitors”.
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