A series of bizarre communication blunders by Habib Essid’s government have highlighted the lack of coordination among several government departments in Tunisia.
Check-up or surgery?
A series of bizarre communication blunders by Habib Essid’s government have highlighted the lack of coordination among several government departments in Tunisia.
Check-up or surgery?
Last week, local newspapers revealed that Tunisian Prime Minister Habib Essid had undergone surgery that coincided with the start of reshuffle consultations led by President Beji Caid Essebsi. Essid’s Media Adviser Zafer Naji denied the prime minister had undergone surgery, saying that Essid had only had a routine checkup. Naji’s statement was refuted however by the Prime Presidency in a statement stressing that Essid was hospitalized for a surgical intervention that required a three-day rest.
Observers say this fluctuated communication reflects a lack of coordination between the Prime Minister’s Office Director Tayeb Youssfi, who runs the state media, and Naji, who is seen only as a token façade. Such contradictory statements by the government have become common.
In March this year, government spokesman Khaled Shawkat pledged that the government would employ thousands of unemployed people. Yet the measures announced only affected existing workers. Such comments were not welcomed in a country that has more than 15 per cent unemployment.
Strange posts in prisons
The French newspaper ‘Le Monde’ described Shawkat in a piece as “the master of media lapses:” Shawkat said he would welcome the return of ousted former dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to the country.
Several ministries have been ridiculed by Tunisians on social media in recent months for their communications. An image published by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) on its website of a meeting chaired by Minister of Justice Omar Mansour in the Mahdia Prison, south of Tunis, stirred more controversy because it was considered humiliating for prisoners. The image (see above) shows the minister and officials seated on a long table. Behind them, prisoners faces peer from behind iron bars. The MoJ removed the image soon after posting it. Human rights and online activists condemned the image, describing it as an insult to prisoners in a country still criticized by human rights advocates.
Well done, my son!
In another MOJ post, officials are pictured inaugurating a landline telephone in a civil prison in the city of Monastir, south of Tunis. Many commentators mocked the token gesture, asking why major reforms of the incarceration system are not being addressed instead. According to reports by local and internatuonal human rights organisations, Tunisian prisons “do not correspond to the most basic international standards.” Many prisons are overcrowded with an occupancy rate of 140 per cent.
Some government websites have been accused of completely missing the point. A few weeks ago, the Ministry of Equipment (MoE) published a photo of the son of a regional director on its website and congratulated him on his graduation from high school. The shades of nepotism aroused the ire of activists on social media and the MoE was soon forced to apologized for the mistake, underlying that from now on its website would only publish news of its activities.
“The current government has not yet understood that political communication is based on a lot of experience and knowledge,” says Karim Bozwetah, an anthropologist and a communication expert. Bozwetah believes that the communication offices in this government, like the other post-revolution governments in the country, are not aware of communication tools, especially those related to social networking.
“Improving the communication and media outcome of any government generally requires a clear communication strategy and competent specialists with skills in the field,” Bozwetah told Correspondents. The commentator expects many high profile media figures in the current government to lose their positions in the forthcoming cabinet reshuffle.
