Assassinations and death threats have led the Tunisian Interior Ministry to seriously consider providing security protection to some political and media figures.
On the morning of September 12 in Tunis, Tunisian security foiled an attempted assassination targeting Ahmed Sedik, a leading left-wing opposition member and prominent leader of the Popular Front. Four suspected Islamist militants were arrested in connection with the incident.
Assassinations and death threats have led the Tunisian Interior Ministry to seriously consider providing security protection to some political and media figures.
On the morning of September 12 in Tunis, Tunisian security foiled an attempted assassination targeting Ahmed Sedik, a leading left-wing opposition member and prominent leader of the Popular Front. Four suspected Islamist militants were arrested in connection with the incident.
The recent political scene in Tunisia has been characterized by repeated death threats against some political, media, trade union members, cultural figures as well as those who are active in the human rights field.
The Interior Ministry earlier revealed that Ansar al-Sharia, a Salafist jihadi group, had been classified by Tunisia as a terrorist organization and that it had planned to assassinate some 20 political and media personalities, including Ahmed Sedik, Mustapha Ben Jaafar, the Chairman of the Constituent Assembly and Widad Bouchmaoui, the President of Tunisia’s Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
The targeted
In a press conference held at the end of August, Mustafa bin Omar, the Director General of Public Security, announced that there was a death list prepared by Ansar al-Sharia, which contained the names of Tayeb Bacouche, the Secretary-General of the Nidaa Tounes Party, one of the most prominent opposition parties in Tunisia as well as some well-known journalists, such as Nawfel el-Wartani, Sofiane Ben Farhat and Haythem el-Maakki, in addition to thinkers such as Mohamed al-Talbi and Olfa Youssef, the film director Nouri Bouzid, a moderate cleric, Sheikh Farid Beji, Habib Kazdaghli, the Dean of the Faculty of Lettres, Arts and Sciences at Manouba University, which prohibits the entry of veiled (specifically those who wear the niqab) female students to classrooms.
“In the month of August, the Tunisian security services have stopped assassination attempts that were ‘most probably’ targeting five personalities, among them is Kamal Morjane, the former defence minister under the ousted Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and who today heads another party with five seats in the Constituent Assembly.
The Director-General of the General Security added that the Interior Ministry had formed specialized squads to provide security protection to personalities targeted with assassination.
Mohamed Ali Laroui, the spokesman for the Interior Ministry said the protection provided three types of security: close protection, bodyguards, or security patrols.
“There are those who asked for security protection themselves after receiving threats and there are those who are provided with protection upon a decision taken by the interior ministry because of information which the ministry has received from intelligence services on attempts on their lives,” Laroui said.
On the other hand, Shaker Bu Ajileh, the media spokesman for the presidency, said “As a normal procedure, presidential security provides protection to personalities who occupy key positions in the state such as the transitional president, the head of the Constituent Assembly and the Prime Minister.” He added that ‘a decision was taken to provide protection to other figures after the assassination of the leftist opposition figure Chokri Belaid in February.
Among these personalities is Beji Caid Essebsi, the President of Nidaa Tounes Party, the spokesperson for the Popular Front Hamma Hammami, the head of Ennahda Movement, Rashid Ghannouchi, the Secretary General of the General Union of Tunisian Workers Hussain Abbasi and Ahmed Najib Chebbi, the leader of the Republican Party.
One political assassination too many
Following the assassination of opposition figure Chokri Belaïd in February, the Constituent Assembly’s MPs had demanded the provision of security protection to various national figures. They blamed the interior ministry and the prime ministry for the assassination because of their lenient and negative means of dealing with the spread of arms in Tunisia, according to MPs’ interventions in the assembly.
“The authorities cannot provide every person with security protection,” Interior Minister Ali Larayedh said shortly after Belaid’s assassination. “In Tunisia today, there is a large Tunisian political class composed of 150 parties, in addition to politicians who are not active in political parties. There are also human rights activists, members of civil society, trade unionists, journalists, statesmen and others,” stressing the difficulty in “provide two persons to protect every person.”
In Tunisia, there are two structures that provide special protection to official personalities. The first is an armed force tasked with providing security to the head of the state and official figures. It is also tasked with providing security to palaces and presidential residencies as well as maintaining public order in the mentioned palaces and residences and in wherever the head of the state or official figures who they are tasked with their protection are present.
The security personnel and department of the head of the state and of official personalities are under the direct control of the President of the Republic.
The second structure is the one responsible for providing protection to key personalities and institutions and it is one of the core structures of the intervention units of the public administration. It provides security protection to conferences, seminars and receptions held at the hotels and for diplomatic missions. Moreover, it is tasked with providing security protection when there are religious occasions and celebrations held by foreigners residing in the cities of Djerba and Tunis (Jewish places of worship and Christian churches), and its members escort foreign dignitaries in their professional visits to Tunisia.
But after the assassination of Chokri Belaïd the Interior Ministry was forced to provide security protection to some key political, trade union, media and human rights figures and activists on the backdrop of receiving death threats.
Zied El Heni, a well-known Tunisian journalist, said that he didn’t ask for any security protection but the ministry offered it when Fathi Dumuq, a businessman who was arrested and accused of buying weapons and forming a criminal gang, made a recorded confession that the aim was to “target and assassinate a number of political activists and journalists.”
El Hani explained that this protection stopped in the beginning of June when he went to Syria in a press related mission, but it was re-initiated directly after the assassination of the opposition leader Mohammed Brahmi.
“These threats do not frighten us,” El Hani said. ”We will not stop performing our work with freedom and we will continue to protect media freedoms, which we consider as the only actual achievement made by the Tunisian people after January 14, 2011.”
Lina Ben Mehni, an activist and a blogger also receives protection she did not explicitly ask for. I receive daily threats sent to my house and to my mobile phone and this has been going on for two years,” she said. “The Interior Ministry informed me that I am among those threatened of physical liquidation and that based on this information it has decided to provide me with body guards to protect me and to send security personnel to guard my family’s house, which they have done since the end of August.”
Ben Mehni said the protections allowed her to move about more freely.
Laroui, the spokesman for the interior ministry called protected personalities and those in need of protection not to speak about the protection provided to media outlets as ”giving such information might help terrorists and facilitate their mission.”
