Tunisia: Too early to assess anti-corruption drive

It is too early to assess the performance of the government’s recently-launched anti-corruption campaign, Tunis Afrique Presse (TAP) reported yesterday, quoting the government spokesman, Iyed Dhamani.

Speaking at a joint press conference yesterday at the Government Palace in Kasbah, with the Interior Minister, Hedi Majdoub, and the Secretary of State for Public Property and Land Affairs, Mabrouk Korchid, Dhamani said: “The anti-corruption drive launched by the government since 23 May is not a temporary campaign.”

The Tunisian official stressed that the government will go ahead with this the work it is carrying out adding that “the next few days will demonstrate the scope of this campaign”.

Read: Opposition: Tunisia isn’t really tackling corruption

Dahmani pledged that the government will exert “every effort” to break up all networks that have harmed the national economy. “The government will use all the legal means in its war on corruption,” Dahmani vowed, noting that this will take a lot of time.

He pointed out that the state will also take a “series of measures” relating to the administration, warning that the campaign “targets anyone who violates the law or harms the national economy or national security”.

During the conference, the Interior Minister, Hedi Majdoub, said that the list of defendants, who have been placed under home arrest since 23 May as part of the campaign, included ten prominent businessmen. He noted that the arrest decision was made between 23 May and 5 June, in accordance with article 5 of Decree No. 78-50 of January 1978 regulating the state of emergency.

On his part, the Secretary of State for Public Property and Land Affairs, Mabrouk Kourchid, stressed that the confiscation of the properties of the arrested businessmen was carried out through an independent legal committee headed by a Tunisian judge, adding that the process was conducted according to the law of confiscation.

Those whose assets were confiscated, had proven to have gained their wealth illegally or through the exploitation of their close relations with the ruling family under President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali

Kourchid said. He explained that the decisions have included a number of the defendants’ properties, shares and money.