Kais Saied | |
|---|---|
| قَيْس سْعَيِّد | |
 Saied in 2023 | |
| 5th President of Tunisia | |
| Assumed office 23 October 2019 | |
| Prime Minister | |
| Preceded by | Mohamed Ennaceur (acting) |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1958-02-22)22 February 1958 (age 67) |
| Political party | Independent |
| Spouse | Ichraf Saied |
| Children | 3 |
| Alma mater | University of Tunis International Institute of Humanitarian Law |
| Profession | Jurist,lecturer in law |
| Signature |  |
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Kais Saied (Arabic:قَيْس سْعَيِّد ; born 22 February 1958) is a Tunisian politician, jurist and former assistant professor of law who has served as the fifthpresident of Tunisia since 2019. He was president of the Tunisian Association of Constitutional Law from 1995 to 2019.
Having worked in various legal and academic roles since the 1980s, Saied joined the2019 presidential election as anindependentsocial conservative with a populist anti-corruption platform supported byEnnahda and others across the political spectrum. He won the second round of the election with 72.71% of the vote, defeatingNabil Karoui, and was sworn in as president on 23 October 2019.
As president, Saied has overseen democratic backsliding, as he has repressed the political opposition and dissidents in Tunisia.[3][4][5] In January 2021,protests began in response to alleged police brutality, economic hardship and theCOVID-19 pandemic. On 25 July 2021, Saied dismissed the parliament andPrime MinisterHichem Mechichi, executinga successful self-coup.[6] Since then, Saied oversaw the dismissal of the judiciary and arrest of his main political opposition figures.[3]
He ruled by decree until he was successfulin passing a new constitution which granted him more powers and calledsnap legislative elections. He wasre-elected president for a second term in October 2024.[7]
Kais Saied is the son of Moncef Saied and Zakia Bellagha fromBéni Khiar (Cap Bon). His paternal uncle, Hicham Saïed, was the first pediatric surgeon in Tunisia, known for having separated twoconjoined twins in the 1970s.[8] Saïed completed his secondary studies atSadiki College.[9]
A jurist by training, Saied is a specialist inconstitutional law, andsecretary-general of the Tunisian Association of Constitutional Law between 1990 and 1995, then vice-president of the association since 1995.
He was the director of the public law department at theUniversity of Sousse between 1994 and 1999, then at theUniversity of Carthage from 1999 to 2018. He was a member of the group of experts of the General Secretariat of theArab League between 1989 and 1990, expert at the Arab Institute for Human Rights from 1993 to 1995 and a member of the committee of experts responsible for revising the draftTunisian Constitution in 2014.[10] He was also a member of the scientific council of several commissions academics.
In 2013, while a visiting professor at severalArab universities, he refused to be part of the commission of experts whose mission was to find a legal solution to the problem of theIndependent High Authority for Elections.[clarification needed] Saied retired in 2018.[11]
From 2013 to 2014, Kais Saied participated in several political clubs and meetings, which bring together young people.[12] In 2016, the Mouassissoun movement was created to support Saied's action and projects.[13]
Saied was one of the first declared candidates in the2019 Tunisian presidential election.[14] Running as anindependentsocial conservative, he had sought to appeal to younger voters.[15] One of his policies included support for allowing citizens torecall their elected officials.[16][17] Saied suggested to voters that many of Tunisia's current issues were due to "non-respect for manyconstitutional laws".[15] He presented a plan to combat corruption, whether it is "moral or financial".[15] Saied was supported by both Islamists and leftists.[18] In a June 2019 interview with the newspaperAcharaâ Al Magharibi, Saied announced his support for thedeath penalty. He also made statements that public expression ofhomosexuality is financed and encouraged by foreign countries, telling the paper:
I was told certain houses were rented by foreign parties... homosexuality has existed throughout history, but certain people want to spread homosexuality.[19]
Kais Saied is against normalisation ofrelations with Israel, saying that Israel is at war with theMuslim world, and anyMuslim leader who normalizes his or her country's relationship with theZionists should be tried for treason. He said his country has no problem with Jews and that Tunisians including his father protected Jews during theSecond World War.[20][21]
Saied has also stated that he is in favor of adecentralised, three-tier,indirect manner of electing national legislative representatives, some elements ofdirect democracy, and believes that local representatives should be elected based oncharacter and itsunderlying structure rather thanpolitical ideology. Due to his relative obscurity and lack of campaigning, several of his positions were not well-defined aside from his social conservatism.[18] Despite being supported byEnnahda in the election and holding socially conservative positions, Saied did not describe himself as anIslamist and had advisers from across thepolitical spectrum.[22] He also is not in favor of adding religious elements to the constitution, stating that these were only his personal beliefs.[citation needed]
Several media sources[15][23][24] referred to Saied as "RoboCop", given his monotonous voice, his use ofStandard Arabic rather thanTunisian dialect, and his focus onlaw and order issues. On his campaign trail, Saied portrayed himself as aman of the people, somewhat similarly toNabil Karoui, another populist candidate. Saied came in first place in the first round of the2019 Tunisian presidential election which took place on 15 September 2019, and moved on to face Karoui in the second round on 13 October, where Saied received 72.71% of the vote, thereby winning the election. The preliminary election results were announced on 14 October, and later confirmed on 17 October, making Saied the new president of Tunisia.[18][25]
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In July 2024, Saied announced that he would run for another presidential term in the2024 Tunisian presidential election, scheduled on 6 October.[26] On 7 October, the electoral authority[who?] announced that Saied was re-elected president of Tunisia with 90.69% of the vote.[27] He was inaugurated for his second term on 21 October.[28]
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Saied was sworn in as Tunisia's president on 23 October 2019, becoming the first president born after the country's independence fromFrance in 1956.[29][30]
The results of the presidential election were announced by theIndependent High Authority for Elections on 17 October. On the same day, Kaïs Saïed chose his brother Naoufel, also a professor of constitutional law, to appoint the advisers and members of the presidential cabinet. The office of theAssembly of the Representatives of the People met on 18 October and fixed the oath on 23 October. This date corresponds to the maximum duration of the presidential interim of 90 days.
Saied took his oath before the outgoing Assembly on 23 October, at thePresidential Palace of Carthage, during which he promised to fight againstterrorism and its causes, as well as to guarantee the gains of Tunisian women, while strengthening economic andsocial rights. He later met with the interim president,Mohamed Ennaceur, who transferred presidential powers to Saied.
Saied refused to stay at thepresidential palace in Carthage, preferring his villa in Mnihla, located in thegovernorate of Ariana. On 30 October, he appointed diplomat Tarek Bettaïeb as head of the presidential cabinet, GeneralMohamed Salah Hamdi as national security adviser, with Tarek Hannachi leading the protocol. Abderraouf Bettaïeb was appointed Minister-Advisor to the President of the Republic, Rachida Ennaifer was put in charge of communication, while Nadia Akacha became responsible for legal affairs.
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The government being semi-presidential, Kais Saied had a week after his inauguration to instruct the party which took the lead in the legislative elections to form a government. The latter then has a month to obtain the confidence of the Assembly of People's Representatives. On 15 November 2019, Saied appointedHabib Jemli, the candidate forEnnahda, to the post of head of government and charged him with forming a cabinet. On 10 January 2020, the Assembly rejected the composition of the government, which was also subject to delays when it was announced. Saied therefore had ten days to appoint a new head of government. On 20 January 2020, he appointedElyes Fakhfakh.
His government was announced on 15 February, but Ennahda, whose ministers were announced there, announced that he would not vote for confidence because of the non-participation ofHeart of Tunisia. A slightly modified version of the government, but without the participation of Heart of Tunisia, was announced on 19 February; Ennahdha, fearing a dissolution, voted to accept the government. On 27 February, the Assembly of People's Representatives granted confidence to the government.
In June 2020, according toAl Jazeera, "an independent member of Parliament published documents indicating that Fakhfakh owned shares in companies that won deals worth 44 million dinars". Fakhfakh denied any wrongdoing. On 15 July 2020, he resigned.[31] On 25 July 2020, Saïed appointedHichem Mechichi head of government, with the task of forming a government in one month and obtaining the confidence of the Assembly of the Representatives of the People.[32] Later on, he assumed office on 2 September 2020.[33]
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On 25 July 2021, in light ofdemonstrations against the government demanding the improvement of basic services and amid theCOVID-19 pandemic, Saied suspended parliament for thirty days and relieved theprime ministerHichem Mechichi of his duties.[34] Saied's actions, which included assuming the executive authority, suspending the Parliament, waiving the immunity of the parliament members, ordering the military to close the parliament building, and closing the offices of some[which?] foreign news agencies, was classed by scholars[who?] as a self-coup, as he disregarded Article 80 of the Tunisian constitution, which states that before raising an emergency state, the president must consult his prime minister and the head of the parliament, and even then, the parliament cannot be suspended.[35][36][37] However, there was no constitutional court in Tunisia to offer jurisdiction in his interpretation of the constitution.[38] The president's decisions were also denounced by human rights organizations and considered by several foreign media outlets and Tunisian political entities as aself-coup.[39][40][41][42] The self-coup came after a series ofprotests against the Ennahda-led government, economic difficulties, and the collapse of the Tunisian health system.[43]
On 24 August 2021, Saied extended the suspension of parliament, although the constitution stated the parliament can only be suspended for a month, raising concerns in some quarters[who?] about the future of democracy in the country.[44] On 22 September, Saied announced that he willrule by decree and ignore parts of the constitution.[45] Saied namedNajla Bouden as Prime Minister on 29 September 2021, making her the first female prime minister both in Tunisia and theArab world.[46] Protests against consolidation of power continued in October 2021.[47] On 13 December 2021, Saied extended the suspension of the parliament until a new election takes place, and announced a nationwide public consultation that would take place from 1 January until 20 March 2022 to gather suggestions for constitutional and other reforms after which Saied would appoint a committee of experts to draft a new constitution. The draft was released in 30 June ahead of the2022 Tunisian constitutional referendum, with Saied announcing thatnew parliamentary elections would be held on 17 December 2022, after going through the referendum and preparing a new electoral system.[48][49][50][51] The referendum was scheduled for 25 July 2022, with opposition, such as theNational Salvation Front—a coalition made up of several political parties, including Ennahda,Al Amal, theDignity Coalition,Heart of Tunisia, announcing that they would boycott the referendum.[52][53] The new constitution was approved with 94.5% of the vote, despite a low turnout of 30.5%. Saied declared victory and promised that Tunisia will enter the new phase after he got increased power, some of which was unchecked.[54] After theparliamentary election, the National Salvation Front called for Kais Saied to resign after less than 9% of eligible voters took part in the elections.[55] Since the self-coup, several high-ranking politicians, such as former prime ministersAli Larayedh andHamadi Jebali, and former presidentMoncef Marzouki, have been arrested.[56][57][58][59]
On 5 January 2022, the Tunisian judiciary referred 19 predominantly high-ranking politicians to court for "electoral violations" allegedly committed during the 2019 presidential elections. Among the 19 were four former prime ministers,Youssef Chahed,Elyes Fakhfakh,Mehdi Jomaa and Hamadi Jebali, as well as former president Moncef Marzouki, and the head of the Ennahda party movement,Rachid Ghannouchi.[60] In February 2022, Saied dissolved the Supreme Judicial Council, the body charged withjudicial independence.[61] According to the country's justice minister[who?], the Saied has indicated that rather than eliminating the Supreme Judicial Council, he will restructure it. This comes days after the country's decision to disband the highest judicial body, which drew international condemnation.[62] As a result of the president's decisions, more than two hundred judges and attorneys in black robes demonstrated outside the main court in Tunisia's capital in February 2022.[63] On 13 February 2022, Saied issued a proclamation appointing a temporary Supreme Judiciary Council.[64]
In February 2023, Saied made comments about African immigration into Tunisia,[65] saying that they werechanging the demographic makeup of the country in order to make it a “purely African” nation.The comments were condemned asracist, including byAmnesty International and theAfrican Union.[66][67][68]
In July 2023, a deal with theEuropean Union on immigration was finalized, following talks with European Commission presidentUrsula Von der Leyen, then Dutch prime ministerMark Rutte, and Italian prime ministerGiorgia Meloni.[69]
Kais Saied is part of the Tunisian tradition of radical support for the Palestinian cause, considering any relationship with Israel to be high treason.[70] In May 2023, after theattack on Djerba, he condemned the attack, rejected all accusations of state antisemitism,[71] and refused to describe the attack as antisemitic.[72] He received Muslim, Jewish, and Christian religious figures,[73] rejected diplomatic recognition of Israel, and called for not conflatingJudaism withZionism.[citation needed] It was announced in September 2023 that the name of theStorm Daniel that destroyed Libya reflects the influence of the global Zionist movement.[74] Shortly after theOctober 7 attacks,[75] Saied expressed Tunisia's full and unconditional support for the Palestinian people, while avoiding mention ofHamas.[70]
In November 2023, Saied objected to a law proposed by theAssembly of the Representatives of the People that would criminalize normalizing relations with Israel, a crime that would carry a sentence of up to 12 years imprisonment, and life imprisonment if the offence was repeated. Saied stated that the law would undermine national security and that "it was counter-productive to criminalize relations with an entity that [Tunisia] does not recognize". Mohamed Ali, a member of the Assembly, claimed that the United States "had threatened 'economic and military sanctions' if the bill were passed".[76][77]
In September 2022, the Tunisian president Kais Saied signed Decree Law 54, which purported to combat "false information and rumours" on the Internet. Article 24 of the decree gives up to five years imprisonment and a fine of up to 50,000dinar for anyone found to be spreading such information. This is doubled if the offending statement is made about a state official.[78][79]
In October 2025, a 56 year old man named Saber Chouchane was sentenced to death for posting on Facebook contents that criticized the president, a ruling which was called "shocking and unprecented".[80] This ruling was based on article 72 of the penal code i.e. "attack aimed at changing the form of government"; Tunisia has had a moratorium ondeath penalty since 1991.[81] Saber Chouchane was imprisoned in January 2024 and, after a wave of criticism and protests, was finally released due to “a presidential pardon”.[82]
In 2023, increasedwater scarcity due toclimate change led the government to establish water rationing in some regions.[83] Additionally, "In May 2023, the Tunisian government said that the wheat harvest was expected to reach only 250,000 tons of grain compared to an annual average of 1.5 million tons, causing the country to import 95% of its grain, "which has led to bread rationing and forced many bakeries to shut their doors". While the government of Kais Saied has tried taking some measures to address the problem, "Tunisians were, globally, the population most dissatisfied with efforts to preserve the environment (tied with Lebanon), according to a Gallup poll".[83]
Kais Saied is married toIchraf Chebil, a judge he met when she was alaw student inSousse. He has three children.[84] Saied's interests include classicalArab music andArabic calligraphy.[85] Most of his supporters call him "Kaisoun".[86]
After assuming the presidency, Kais Saied garnered significant media attention for his handwritten official letters in fineMaghrebi script.[87][88]
_-_ribbon_bar.gif)
Grand Master and Grand Collar of the Order of Independence_-_ribbon_bar.gif)
Grand Master and Grand Collar of theOrder of the Republic
Grand Master and Grand Collar of theNational Order of Merit of Tunisia
Algeria:_-_ribbon_bar.gif)
Collar (Athir Class) of theNational Order of Merit (2 February 2020)[89]
Palestine:
Grand Collar of the State of Palestine (8 December 2021)[90]Saied is the author of a number of works on constitutional law, including:
"It is a racist approach, just like the campaigns in Europe," Romdhane Ben Amor, spokesperson for the Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights (FTDES), was reported as saying by Reuters.
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| Preceded by Mohamed Ennaceur Acting | President of Tunisia 2019–present | Incumbent |
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