TUNIS, Tunisia (AP) – A growing space for youth unrest, which is entering a source of economic frustration, is sweeping Tunisia and worrying its leadership to the top. After all, it is the country that started the revolutions in the Arab Spring of 2011.
One third of the young people of the North African nation are unemployed – and many are upset by their stagnant wealth. For the fourth day in a row, 11.7 million people took to the streets in violent demonstrations across the country – from the capital of Tunis to the cities of Kasserine, Gafsa, Sousse and Monastir.
The protests led to a muscular response from authorities who feared repeated protests that led to the ouster of powerful President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali 10 years ago. The army was deployed in four hot spots. Here’s what happens:
TUNISIA’S PROTEST MOVEMENT IS GROWING
Since Friday, protest groups that are growing every day have been in place every night. They organize simultaneous, often violent demonstrations in Tunisian cities.
The groups threw stones at municipal buildings, threw Molotov cocktails, robbed, vandalized and clashed with police. The unrest is concentrated in poor, densely populated districts, where confidence in law enforcement is already lacking.
The army was called by the government on Sunday night to quell tensions and protect the country’s institutions. Police said hundreds of protesters had been arrested.
WHAT PROTEST?
The exact causes are not clear, but the terrible economic outlook for the stagnant North African country is at the heart of its discontent.
Carrying placards such as “Employment is a right, not a favor,” protesters are outraged by the broken promises of President-elect Kaïs Saied and his government, which have failed to turn an economy on the verge of bankruptcy.
Ten years after the historic revolution, whose slogan was “employment, freedom and dignity”, Tunisians feel they have nothing but that. One-third of Tunisia’s young people are unemployed and one-fifth of the country lives below the poverty line, according to the National Institute of Statistics.
Young people do not remember the repression under Ben Ali and want job opportunities. Communicate this common frustration through social media, as in neighboring Algeria, where a youth-led protest movement has long forced its leader to relinquish power in 2019.
WHY DID THE PANDEMIC DO THINGS?
The country’s disparate blockade restrictions and an October night extinguishing to limit the spread of COVID-19 have exacerbated tensions.
The pandemic has particularly affected Tunisia’s key tourism sector, once fueled by its beautiful historic cities and white sand beaches.
The flights have been grounded, and potential tourists face blockages at home and a general reluctance to travel when variants of contagious viruses flow through nations and continents.
HOW TO RESPOND TO THE AUTHORITIES?
Amnesty International has urged Tunisian authorities to use restraint to calm tensions and uphold the rights of hundreds of detainees, but authorities have increasingly relied on the military for help and used tear gas against protesters.
The Interior Ministry justified the police’s robust response as necessary “to protect the physical integrity of citizens and public and private property.”
Others disagree. The president of the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights, Abderrahman Lahdhili, said that this approach “is not the most appropriate” and the authorities should look at the “deep reasons” behind it. Every year, Lahdhili said, 100,000 students drop out of school and 12,000 of them resort to illegal migration, leading to overcrowded smugglers’ boats in a risky attempt to reach Europe. Others, he said, fall prey to the recruitment of extremist organizations.
ARE THERE ISLAMISTIC FORCES BEHIND THE PROTESTS?
Saied, the conservative president, tried to speak directly to protesters by making an unexpected visit on Monday evening to see them in the popular M’nihla district, near Tunis.
He warned protesters against extremist Islamist forces “acting in the shadows” that he said were trying to ferment chaos and destabilize the democratically elected government.
It is unclear whether this is simply a way to remove guilt from his government for unrest or whether Islamist forces are really behind the movement. Saied himself is an outsider who won with the support of moderate Islamists.
The leader of the influential Islamist-inspired Ennahda party in Tunisia, Rached Ghannouchi, has condemned the recent “acts of robbery and vandalism.”
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