Tunisian President Dismisses Defense Minister

On Monday, Tunisian President Kais Saied issued a presidential order to dismiss Defense Minister Ibrahim Al-Bertaji.

Two security sources reported that Tunisian President Kais Saied assigned Khaled Yahyaoui, the Director General of the Presidential Security Unit, to supervise the Interior Ministry after dismissing the government on Sunday, according to Reuters.

On Sunday evening, Tunisia’s president Kais Saied decided to dismiss the government head and freeze the parliament against the backdrop of mass protests regarding the deterioration of the North African nation’s health, economic and social situation.

Thousands of people defied virus restrictions and scorching heat to demonstrate in the capital of Tunis and other cities. The largely young crowds chanted slogans calling for the dissolution of parliament and early elections.

In a statement, President Saied announced that he would assume executive authority with the assistance of a new prime minister, in the biggest challenge yet to a 2014 democratic constitution that split powers between the president, prime minister and parliament.

Years of paralysis, corruption, declining state services and growing unemployment had already soured many Tunisians on their political system before the global pandemic hammered the economy last year and COVID-19 infection rates shot up this summer.

Ennahda, banned before the revolution, has been the most consistently successful party since 2011 and a member of successive coalition governments.

“Many people were deceived by hypocrisy, treachery and robbery of the rights of the people,” Saied said in a statement carried on state media.

“I warn any one who thinks of resorting to weapons… and whoever shoots a bullet, the armed forces will respond with bullets,” he added.

Soon after the statement, people flooded the streets of Tunis in defiance of a COVID-19 curfew, as supporters of Saied honked car horns and cheered the news.