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Tunisia

International solidarity against authoritarian restoration!

Saturday 30 October 2021, by Abir Selim

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In Tunisia, police and legal repression of a gravity and magnitude not seen since the establishment of liberal democracy in 2011 is currently targeting protesters of all political stripes.

Already brutal against participants in the social movement of the winter of 2020-2021, the repression has spread and worsened since the coup d’état of July 25, 2021. Former parliamentarians have been brought before military courts and imprisoned. Critical journalists are prevented from doing their jobs and harassed by the police. The latter have been unleashed against the inhabitants of working-class neighbourhoods, LGBT people, associative and political activists, trade unionists and so on.

In their sights: the youth forged by revolution

A dozen feminist, LGBT and far-left activists have been charged with – among other things – alleged “violence against public officials.” Their legal file was transferred to the court in Jendouba, far from Tunis, their city of residence. Journalist and feminist Arroi Baraket is charged with assaulting a police officer. Originally scheduled for 22 October, the trial has been postponed to 26 January. On 21 October, Badr Baabou, the president of the LGBT association Damj, was seriously injured by police officers who took possession of his mobile phone and data about the association. He is currently hospitalized.

These activists belong to the youth forged by the revolution. All have been particularly active and active in the mobilizations of the last ten years. Aspiring to radical change, they fight against authoritarianism, patriarchy and capitalism, seeking to build alliances between residents of working-class neighbourhoods, feminist and LGBT activists.

By putting an end to the liberal democracy instituted in 2011, the coup is the brutal response to the contradictions between, on the one hand, the spaces of self-organization and contestation that the revolution has opened and, on the other hand, the maintenance of capitalist and patriarchal order. For several years, countless workers have questioned employers’ arbitrariness and demanded more dignified working conditions. Countless women have demanded gender equality and an end to gender-based violence, alongside the formation of an LGBT movement.

While social inequality and poverty have imploded, the authoritarian restoration aims to safeguard the interests of the employers and maintain patriarchy.

The Nouveau parti anticapitaliste (NPA) expresses its solidarity with all those in Tunisia who are resisting authoritarian restoration and fighting for a more just society.

P.S.

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