Europeans, Americans or Tunisians… More than 270 academics raise their voices against the “authoritarian and racist regime” of the Tunisian president. They demand with one voice through a petition that Kais Saied be stripped of an honorary title awarded in 2021 by the Italian University of La Sapienza.
In a letter addressed to the rector of this prestigious public university in Rome, Antonella Polimeni, they accuse the Tunisian head of state “of committing serious abuses against migrants from sub-Saharan Africa who reside or transit through the country”. They deplore the clashes between Tunisians and migrants which “cost the life of a Beninese in May and a Tunisian on July 3” in Sfax.
Divert attention from economic and social problems
Among the signatories, Mouna Balghouthi, Tunisian coordinator of the NGO Mobilizing for rights associates (MRA) and researcher in philosophy at El Manar University in Tunis, accuses the Tunisian head of state of wanting to “depict a new danger to divert attention to economic and social problems”. “The second objective is a clear and complete acquiescence to the requests and pressures of the Italian authorities to control the flow of immigrants,” she told AFP.
Sana Ben Achour, feminist activist and professor of public law, or the French mathematician Cédric Villani also initialed the text.
“Racist and xenophobic” discourse
On February 21, President Saied denounced the arrival of “hordes of migrants” in his country during a speech punctuated by “racist and xenophobic” remarks, according to these petitioners. They also condemn his constitutional reforms “intended to concentrate power in his hands, to undermine the institutional foundations essential for human rights, including to undermine the independence of the judiciary and the right to freedom of expression”.
A little over a month after the honorary ceremony held in his presence at La Sapienza, Kais Saied granted himself full powers on July 25, 2021 by dismissing his Prime Minister at the time and freezing Parliament. Since this coup, he has ruled the country by decree. The Constitution, which he had amended by referendum in the summer of 2022, greatly reduced the powers of Parliament in favor of an ultra-presidentialist system. In addition, since February, around twenty opponents and personalities have been imprisoned.