The presidency announced on 23 July, marking the 69th anniversary of the proclamation of the Republic, a pardon for 2,439 detainees and conditional release for 490 more, 2,929 people in all. Tunisian outlets reported that former presidential candidate Ayachi Zammel (arrested days before the 2024 election and convicted in several cases over the collection of electoral sponsorships), and Wadie Jary, the former head of the football federation, were among those freed; no detailed official list of beneficiaries was published. Business News, which broke the claim, attributed it to sources close to the circles of power, while Kapitalis reported the releases as fact. Freeing Zammel two days before the 25 July anniversary makes the clemency a political signal as much as a judicial act.
Source:
Webdo · Thursday, 23 July 2026
On the eve of Republic Day, UGTT secretary-general Slaheddine Selmi delivered an unusually blunt speech, saying the promises of a "new Tunisia", of fighting corruption, reviving development and creating jobs had produced "the exact opposite": falling purchasing power, a soaring cost of living and failing services in health, education, transport, electricity, water, medicines and the social security funds. He blamed the concentration of decision-making and the sidelining of the national organisations and civil society for the collapse of trust, and called for a review of public policy, more investment in state-owned enterprises and a return to dialogue. The UGTT is the largest organised force outside the state and the one interlocutor the presidency has bargained with since 2021, which makes so open a break on a national holiday more than rhetoric.
Parliament's finance and budget committee approved two financings on 21 July: a 110-million-euro EBRD loan to the Compagnie des phosphates de Gafsa for mining equipment, fleet renewal and high-pressure filtration units for industrial water, and a 120-million-dollar facility from the International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation to the Groupe chimique tunisien to import sulphur and ammonia. CPG expects to raise extraction capacity by around 30 percent and lift water recovery from about 60 percent to over 90 percent, though its own management puts the full turnaround at five to seven years. Phosphates are one of the few levers Tunisia has to earn hard currency without borrowing more abroad, which makes that timetable the crux of it.