Can Tunisia tax what it cannot measure?
The government's orientations for the 2027 finance bill, presented to a restricted ministerial council on 4 August, rest on national resources, fiscal justice, and the gradual integration of the informal economy into the formal circuit. The wealth tax introduced by article 88 of the 2026 finance law is the instrument the argument has settled on. Two tax specialists say the administration cannot yet value what it proposes to tax, the UGTT says the burden is being placed on the wrong shoulders, and a columnist sets the budget's growth assumption of 1.9 percent against expected inflation of around 5 percent.
Where they agree
Four of the five are arguing about the same thing: whether the domestic tax base can be made to yield more, and on what terms. The government puts fiscal justice and the informal economy among its priorities, the union wants the scale redrawn, and the two specialists want the valuation rules settled first. Bellagha is the one who does not argue about the base at all.
Where they split
The two specialists locate the obstacle in the machinery: the administration lacks reliable asset information, and the choice of valuation method for indirect stakes in holding companies is unsettled, so the same tax falls unevenly on very different holdings. The union locates it in who pays, and asks for the exempt band to rise from 5,000 to 7,000 dinars and the scale to widen from seven brackets to nine. Bellagha locates it ahead of both: at 1.9 percent growth against inflation near 5 percent, he argues, real purchasing power is falling whatever the tax brings in.
What nobody is saying
None of these five accounts puts a figure on what the wealth tax is expected to raise in 2027. Hadidane's objections were published on 25 June, before the orientations existed; Sallemi's appeared on 7 August, three days after them, and still name no expected yield.
Zaâfrani Zenzri chaired the restricted ministerial council on 4 August and placed the 2027 budget inside the 2026 to 2030 development plan. At the same meeting finance minister Michket Slama Khaldi presented the execution of the 2026 budget and stressed the economy's resilience despite financial pressure and international uncertainty.
In a letter to the finance minister, the UGTT proposes raising the exempt band from 5,000 to 7,000 dinars, roughly the level of the minimum wage, moving the scale from seven brackets to nine, and lifting the top threshold to 100,000 dinars. The union wants investment credits raised to 8 billion dinars, a rebalancing between domestic and external borrowing, and fewer direct facilities from the central bank. It criticises the government's budget note for an austerity orientation and finds no concrete measures against precarious employment or to protect the purchasing power of low earners and the middle class.
”orientation d'austérité susceptible d'affecter la qualité des services publics”an austerity orientation liable to affect the quality of public services
Sallemi's argument is about preconditions rather than the rate: the information on what people own, the transparency of the valuation rules, and the tax administration's capacity to apply control evenly. He warns about equal treatment: a stake in a family firm, a holding in an unlisted company and business assets follow different economic logics.
”L'efficacité d'un impôt sur la fortune ne dépend pas uniquement de son taux ou de son rendement, mais avant tout de la qualité de l'information patrimoniale dont dispose l'administration fiscale”The effectiveness of a wealth tax depends not only on its rate or its yield, but above all on the quality of the asset information available to the tax administration
Hadidane says explicitly that his objections concern the application of article 88 of the 2026 finance law rather than the principle. He points out that it is unsettled whether someone whose assets exceed three million dinars but who is fully exempt must still file a declaration. He adds that valuing indirect stakes in holding companies forces a choice between historic book value and market value, and that the two produce radically different results.
”Pour un actionnaire détenant moins de 50 % du capital, déterminer la valeur à déclarer relève du parcours du combattant”For a shareholder holding less than 50 percent of the capital, working out the value to declare is an obstacle course
Bellagha's target is the figure the budget rests on rather than the tax instruments. He sets the announced growth of 1.9 percent against expected inflation of around 5 percent and concludes that real purchasing power is falling, whatever official communiqués say. He puts youth unemployment above 38 percent.
”Un pays qui produit un peu plus de richesse, pendant que les prix montent trois fois plus vite, ne s'enrichit pas : il perd du pouvoir d'achat réel”A country that produces a little more wealth while prices rise three times as fast is not getting richer: it is losing real purchasing power