Tunisia climate of fear pushes sub-Saharan migrants to the exit

Tunis, Tunisia (AFP):

A steady flow of taxis has rolled up outside the Ivorian embassy in Tunis in recent days, depositing dozens of migrants who say they no longer feel safe amid an officially sanctioned climate of fear.

After a wave of arrests in recent weeks, President Kais Saied gave a speech that critics said was openly racist.

Many sub-Saharan Africans in Tunisia are now heading for the exit. “We want to go home,” said Constant, who arrived at the embassy in the hope of getting her paperwork in order.

In his speech, Saied had ordered officials to take “urgent measures” to tackle irregular migration, claiming without evidence that “a criminal plot” was underway “to change Tunisia’s demographic make-up”.

His comments, praised by French far-right former presidential candidate Eric Zemmour, were seen by many as inciting violence against sub-Saharan Africans living in Tunisia legally or illegally.

Aboubacar Dobe, head of a radio station for French-speaking migrants, said it was “clear that things are different since Saied’s speech”.

The head of Radio Libre Francophone said he had received threatening phone calls.

“When it was just the (recently created far-right) Tunisian Nationalist Party or on social media, people thought the state would protect them,” he said. “Now, they feel abandoned.”

The African Union also expressed concern following Saied’s remarks on migrants, calling on its member states to “refrain from racialised hate speech that could bring people to harm”.