Tunisia’s Ennahda Leader Ghannouchi Receives 22-Year Prison Sentence
The decision reinforced previous rulings against 40 politicians, journalists, bloggers, and business figures, while reducing the sentence of one female defendant and ordering her release, judicial sources told state media.
On Feb. 5, a lower court sentenced 41 defendants to prison terms ranging from five to 54 years, including Ghannouchi, who has been in detention since April 17, 2023, following a police raid on his home. He has subsequently received multiple sentences in separate cases.
An unnamed judicial source told Tunisia’s official news agency that the appeals court upheld all convictions except that of Shatha Belhaj Mubarak. “Her sentence was reduced from five years to two, with the court ordering a suspension of execution,” the source said.
Belhaj Mubarak was released, with the two-year sentence enforceable only if she commits another offense during the probation period.
Under Tunisian law, appeals court decisions are not final. Defendants may challenge them before the Court of Cassation, although such appeals do not suspend the enforcement of prison terms.
All defendants deny charges that include conspiring against state security, seeking to alter the nature of the state, inciting Tunisians to confront one another with weapons, provoking violence and looting, and committing hostile acts against the president.
In Tunisian legal terms, the charge of committing a “hostile act against the president” covers conduct considered a serious assault on the head of state, including threats, physical attacks, or actions perceived as undermining state authority.
The Instalingo case centers on a digital media and communications company based in Kalaa Kebira, Sousse governorate. Authorities raided its headquarters on Sept. 10, 2021, citing alleged state security violations, money laundering, and online defamation.
Tunisian authorities maintain the prosecutions are criminal in nature, insisting there is no political interference, though opposition figures argue the case is part of a broader effort to target critics of President Kais Saied.
On July 25, 2021, Saied imposed exceptional measures, including dissolving parliament, ruling by decree, adopting a new constitution via referendum, and calling early legislative elections.
Opposition groups have described these steps as a coup against the constitution and a slide toward one-man rule, while supporters argue they corrected the trajectory of Tunisia’s 2011 revolution that ousted longtime ruler Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Saied has repeatedly defended his actions as constitutional measures designed to safeguard the state from imminent danger, asserting that rights and freedoms remain intact.
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