The mayor of a Tunisian locality in the governorate of Ben Arous was briefly taken into police custody on Monday, September 26, 2022, after the suicide of a street vendor whose balance was seized by municipal services. According to local media, Mohamed Amine Dridi, 25, hanged himself on Saturday in the town of Mornag south of Tunis, two days after municipal officials confiscated the electronic scale he used to weigh fruits and vegetables. which he sold on a stall.
The mayor of Mornag, Omar Hirbaoui, was taken into custody as part of an investigation into this suicide. He was heard by an investigating judge who decided to release him pending the investigation. This suicide echoes that of Mohamed Bouazizi, the traveling salesman who set himself on fire on December 17, 2010 to protest against the confiscation of his goods by the police, triggering the Tunisian revolution which put an end to the reign of President Zine. el Abidine Ben Ali and kick-started the Arab Spring revolts in the region.
The daily La Presse sees it as a “remake of the case of Mohamed Bouazizi, who died in January 2011 following his attempted suicide by self-immolation. An incident which caused the fall of the regime of former President Ben Ali, but did not put an end to the ordeal of the sellers walkers and failed to establish a grain of social justice”.
On the evening of September 25, clashes pitted protesters against law enforcement in Mornag, according to local media and images posted on social media. Chanting slogans denouncing unemployment and the high cost of living, these demonstrators burned tires and blocked the main artery in Mornag. The police fired tear gas to disperse them. According to the Ministry of the Interior, the seller who took his own life was suffering from “serious family problems”which his brother denies.
Social discontent is brewing in Tunisia, a country facing a serious economic crisis which is reflected in recurrent shortages of basic foodstuffs and high inflation. NGOs and the opposition accuse the security services of resorting to methods reminiscent of those of the police state under the former dictatorship, since President Kaïs Saïed assumed full powers in July 2021 and had a new Constitution seen as a threat to democracy in Tunisia.
Another demonstration against the deterioration of living conditions, during which tires were set on fire, took place in the night from Sunday to Monday, in the popular district of Douar Hicher in the north of Tunis, reports the local press.