Borj Erras went weeks without water, and the people who protested are under investigation for conspiracy
From Saturday the state water utility Sonede is to give Borj Erras, a hillside area in the Mahdia district, an hour and a half to two hours of water a day. Families had gathered outside the governorate offices to demand the release of their detained sons. On Friday 14 August the Tunisian Human Rights League and the Mahdia bar association said young people who protested, and people who filmed the protests, are facing conspiracy charges.
Where they agree
Both sides treat the cut as long enough to need explaining. The governorate calls its own remedy an exceptional measure, and the rights bodies build their case on people who had been without water for weeks. What they do not agree on is how long: the governorate services put the continuous cut at close to 20 days, the lawyer Mestiri writes of more than a month, and neither addresses the other's figure.
Where they split
The governorate and the rights voices are answering different questions. The governorate explains why the water stopped and points at national capacity and a desalination plant that is not yet running. The LTDH, the bar association, Ben Amor and Mestiri do not take up why the supply failed; all four condemn the same two texts, article 72 and decree 54, and what was done to the people who complained. The observatory is not in that exchange at all: its report counts the whole country's water complaints for July and was published before any of these statements.
What nobody is saying
No source cited here names who decided to open a conspiracy investigation, or what evidence it rests on. Al-Quds Al-Arabi reports the charges only through the rights bodies and the lawyers contesting them, and gives no number for how many people are being held.
The two bodies condemn the legal action that followed the water protests: conspiracy charges, article 72 of the penal code, article 24 of decree 54 of 2022. The charges were brought against young people who demonstrated peacefully and against people who filmed the protests and passed them on. The young people were citizens aware of their rights, they write, and turning their demand into a case file turns a claim of right into grounds for suspicion.
”لا يجوز أن تتحول الكاميرا التي تنقل الاحتجاج إلى جريمة، ولا الكلمة التي تصف المعاناة إلى مؤامرة، ولا المطالبة بالماء إلى تهديد للأمن العام”The camera that relays the protest must not become a crime, the word that describes the suffering must not become a conspiracy, and the demand for water must not become a threat to public security
Ben Amor objects to the two texts being used at all against people protesting for the right to water. Article 24 of decree 54 carries, on his account, five years in prison and a 50,000 dinar fine for putting out false information online. Al-Quds notes that article 72 of the penal code punishes with death an attack aimed at changing the form of the state.
”توجيه تهم حسب الفصل 72 من المجلة الجزائية والفصل 24 من المرسوم 54 للمحتجين من أجل الحق في الماء”Bringing charges under article 72 of the penal code and article 24 of decree 54 against those protesting for the right to water
Mestiri lists some of the charges the file was opened on: expressing an opinion in order to form a conspiracy against the internal security of the state, and an attack meant to change the form of the state or to stir up disorder, killing and looting. The people under investigation, he writes, asked for water after more than a month of thirst in Borj Erras.
”كنت دائمًا أقول إن المهدية محرومة من قضايا التآمر. والحمد لله، أخيرًا أتتنا قضية تآمر!”I always used to say Mahdia was deprived of conspiracy cases. And thank God, at last one has arrived!
From Saturday 15 August the state water utility Sonede is to give Borj Erras an hour and a half to two hours of water a day, for more than a week. The governorate services told TAP this is an exceptional measure to end a continuous cut of close to 20 days. The shortage is not regional, they say, but a matter of national capacity, and one of the main causes is the delay in commissioning the Sidi Abdelhamid desalination plant at Sousse.
In July 2026 the observatory logged 608 reports of trouble with water supply, the highest monthly total this year, of which 549 concerned unannounced cuts and disruptions to drinking water. The reports concentrated on the coast: Nabeul 65, Monastir 62, Mahdia 51 and Sousse 49. Protests over water rose from 23 in June to 34 in July, which the report calls a dangerous indicator.
”مرحلة حرجة من الطوارئ المائية”a critical phase of water emergency