- Tunisian President Kais Saied was re-elected with 90.7% of the votes in the presidential election held on 6 October 2024.
- This re-election strengthens the ongoing restoration of dictatorship that began with the coup d’état on 25 July 2021, pushing Tunisia further away from the hopes of its democratic transition.
- The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) expresses deep concern over the state of threatened rights and freedoms in Tunisia, as well as for the plight of human rights defenders who are facing a wave of repression never seen after 2011.
11 October, 2024. Kais Saied was re-elected with 90.7% of the votes on 6 October 2024, after imprisoning one of his two competitors and effectively preventing any campaigning. This score, presented as a plebiscite, is based on a reported participation rate of 28.8%, the lowest since the 2011 revolution. Furthermore, none of the electoral statistics provided by the Independent High Authority for Elections (ISIE), which is only independent in name, can be verified.
To secure the victory of the incumbent President, the ISIE disobeyed the decision of the Administrative Court to reinstate three candidates on the presidential election list, a first in Tunisia. Another significant indicator of the elections’ lack of reliability is the ISIE’s rejection of requests from civil society organisations, such as I-Watch and Mourakiboun, which have been monitoring all elections since 2011. Similarly, all foreign journalists seeking accreditation to cover the election period in Tunisia were denied access.
These elections must be recognised for what they truly are: a democratic masquerade. The dictator of Tunisia is consolidating his hold on power, silencing dissenting voices. His presidency, since his election in 2019 and especially following the coup d’état on July 25, 2021, has been characterised by a brutal takeover of all powers and institutions in the country.
FIDH has raised alarms, through the support committee for freedoms in Tunisia, regarding the return to dictatorship and the inaction of Tunisia’s international partners, particularly the European Union. There is an important concern about an escalation of repression against civil society in Tunisia. FIDH is closely monitoring the situation of its member organisations in Tunisia, its partners, and the entire human rights movement and its defenders. The European Union must swiftly withdraw its support, whether explicit or implicit, for the regime of Kais Saied. This includes revising its migration policy, which amounts to outsourcing the management of migration flows to a dictatorship, thereby being complicit in the externalisation of human rights violations against migrants.
