The Secretary-General of the Tunisian General Labor Union (the largest trade union in the country), Noureddine Taboubi, called today, Friday, for participatory dialogue, discarding differences between the various parties, and not clinging to positions, while the Tunisian Ministry of Interior announced the thwarting of a terrorist operation targeting a tourist area.
In statements to reporters during a union meeting in the city of Gafsa (southwest), Tabboubi said that the differences should be resolved according to one rule, which is to save the country in light of the difficult economic and financial conditions that Tunisia is going through.
He added that there is a need for all political parties to meet at the table of a national dialogue, to discard differences, and to abandon the narrow base of interests in order to reach the elections.
In this context, he declared, “We have to overcome the difference, whether or not what happened on 25 July was a coup. It is the Tunisian people who pay the bill for this difference and the deterioration of social and economic conditions.”
Crisis indicators
The Secretary-General of the Labor Union presented indications of the deteriorating economic and financial conditions in the country.
He pointed out that inflation rates and the deterioration of the purchasing power of citizens are higher than the official figures.
He pointed out, in this context, that the Union’s data indicate that purchasing power has deteriorated by 38%, not only by 25%, as the authorities say.
He also pointed out the delay in the payment of employees’ salaries, explaining that Tunisian experts have confirmed that money is being printed in order to fulfill the state’s obligations towards employees.
Al-Taboubi directed implicit criticism of President Qais Saeed because of the state of affairs in the country since the exceptional measures he announced last July, which included freezing Parliament and dissolving the government, before issuing on September 22 Decree 117, which allows him to fully acquire all powers.
The statements of the Secretary-General of the largest trade union in Tunisia come a day after the Speaker of the Assembly of People’s Representatives, Rached Ghannouchi, called for a national dialogue that does not exclude anyone, and asked President Saeed to retract his exceptional measures in order to get the country out of its political and economic crisis.
thwarting a terrorist attack
On the other hand, the Tunisian Ministry of Interior announced today, Friday, that it had thwarted a terrorist attack targeting a tourist area in Tunisia.
The ministry said – in a statement – that it had arrested a 22-year-old woman returning from Syria who was planning to blow herself up in an unspecified tourist area, noting that she left Tunisia in the summer of 2020, and traveled the following year to Syria, where she received training to carry out a suicide attack.
She added that the woman was arrested on the tenth of this month at Tunis-Carthage International Airport.
The Tunisian Ministry of Interior stated that the investigation also revealed the involvement of another terrorist element of Tunisian nationality in planning this attack, explaining that he was going to provide the arrested woman with an explosive belt.