Corruption and reconciliation: prison, or paying it back
Tunisia can jail people who took public money, or let them settle and pay it back. By 29 September the settlement commission had published no agreement, no release and no recovered sum, while the courts remanded seven suspects and handed down prison terms in two other cases.
Tunisia handles money taken from the state in two ways that pull in opposite directions. The courts send people to prison. A settlement scheme created by decree-law 13 of 2022 lets them pay instead. It covers businessmen and officials treated as trustees of public money, for economic and financial offences in particular, and reaches acts from before 2022. A national commission examines each application. The lawyer Amel Hammami says the legislator wanted a justice built on reparation and the recovery of public money rather than mainly on prison sentences.
Kaïs Saïed set the target at 13.5 billion dinars, drawn from the sums attributed to the 460 people in the national corruption inquiry's report. The third settlement commission swore its oath before him on 26 June 2026, under Ali Abbess, taking over a file that had worn out two commissions. Business News reported on 29 September that it had announced no agreement, recorded no release and communicated no recovered sum. The law gives it four months to rule on each application, counted from a referral date nobody has published.
Decree-law 2 of 2026 appeared in the official gazette on Wednesday 30 September. It rewrites parts of two articles of the 2022 text: article 25, on provisional settlements, and article 30, on where the proceeds go. A provisional settlement now needs at least half the sums owed, and the balance must be paid within two years. That deadline was three months in 2022 and six months under law 3 of 2024. The settlement commission may propose less than half when it judges the applicant's evidence certain and serious.
A provisional settlement does not close the case. Hammami says it suspends the criminal consequences only while the undertakings are being carried out. If the applicant does not finish them, the prosecution, the trial or the execution of the sentence resumes, and the money pledged as a guarantee passes to the state. Article 30 of the 2022 text leaves the National Security Council to decide which fields and which projects the proceeds pay for, and the 2026 amendment earmarks them for projects of national importance and for development projects.
Meanwhile the courts moved: Webdo reported on 14 September that seven were remanded in Monastir over suspected corruption and money laundering. On 22 September a chamber in Tunis handed Nesrine Ben Ali and Sakher El Materi six years each. Webdo, citing Mosaïque FM, said the judgment was in absentia. La Presse reported on 2 October that the Tunis appeal court had confirmed ten years for a former member of the dissolved parliament, five for a former environment minister and two suspended for his wife.
”Today the opportunity is open again, for those implicated whether at home or abroad, to conclude a penal settlement with them, which is then put before the National Security Council.”
The numbers
What the comparison shows
Where they agree
Both say the point is to get public money back rather than to fill prisons.
Where they split
Saïed and Hammami are not arguing: he names the outcome he wants, public money back and the files closed fast, she names what the amended text requires, at least half the sums and a suspension that lapses if the payments stop, and neither answers the other anywhere on this page.
What nobody is saying
Nobody says whether any of the people in those three court cases has applied to settle. No source here names the former member of the dissolved parliament, his wife, the former environment minister or the seven remanded in Monastir, and none gives the number of files the settlement commission has examined, the number of settlements the National Security Council has approved, or any sum transferred to the state. The settlement side is counted in dinars and the court side in years of prison: no source here gives a sum recovered through a court. Webdo mentions a fine of more than four billion dinars against Sakher El Materi in a separate case, and a fine is a penalty imposed, not money shown to have reached the treasury.
Who says what
Presents the settlement as an opportunity reopened rather than a court. He said at Carthage in June that he wants no court for settling scores but a settlement that returns to the people every millime looted from them, and that the offer is open to those in prison and to those outside the country. He told Ali Abbess to stop wasting time on procedures that lead nowhere, and said there is no room for bargaining or for the language of blackmail.
”اليوم تتاح الفرصة من جديد، سواء لمن تورطوا في الداخل أو في الخارج، لإبرام صلح جزائي معهم يُعرض إثر ذلك على مجلس الأمن القومي”Today the opportunity is open again, for those implicated whether at home or abroad, to conclude a penal settlement with them, which is then put before the National Security Council.
Reads the 2026 decree-law as a stage in the mechanism rather than a break with it. She says it does not undo the system put in place in 2022, that it gives the commission a margin of judgement over the applicant's particular situation, and that the deadline to pay the balance has moved from three months to six and now to two years. She is explicit that a provisional settlement only suspends the criminal consequences and does not end them.
”يمثّل مرحلة جديدة في تطوير منظومة الصلح وتفعيل تطبيقها على أرض الواقع، ويرسّخ مصالحة مع رجال الأعمال والموظّفين باعتبارهم مؤتمنين على المال العام”It represents a new stage in developing the settlement system and in putting it into practice on the ground, and it establishes a reconciliation with businessmen and officials in their capacity as trustees of public money.
Our coverage
- New decree eases Tunisia's economic 'reconciliation' scheme, but settles nothing finalSunday, 4 October 2026
- Appeals court upholds prison terms for former lawmaker, ex-minister in corruption caseSaturday, 3 October 2026
- Nesrine Ben Ali and Sakher El Materi sentenced in absentia to six years each for misuse of public fundsTuesday, 22 September 2026
- Seven remanded in Monastir market-concession corruption and money-laundering caseSaturday, 12 September 2026