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I always thought I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to enter the world of journalism after 2011, in the wake of the Tunisian revolution. Back then, I was dreamy and young, basking in the breeze of freedom gifted to us by the blood of those who were murdered during a popular revolution whose most important slogan was “work, freedom, national dignity”. But this dream was soon to burst, with the issuance of Decree-law 54.
I embarked on my career as a journalist imbued with the values of absolute freedom. I had not lived through the Ben Ali regime’s violations of freedom of expression, or its attack on the freedom of the press through its repressive apparatus whose aim was to ensure the suppression of diversity and intellectual and political pluralism. I believed in and was passionate about free journalistic endeavors, which steered me toward investigative journalism. Why not, I thought, living as I was in a country that guarantees freedom of expression and publication and that has a constitution and laws that are respectfully compatible with international standards.
As fate would have it, it so happened that my first investigative piece coincided with the issuance of Decree-law 54 of 2022 related to “cybercrime”. At the time, I was busy with the final stages of my article, entitled “Bolt Tunisia: Tax fraud, undermining the market, and personal data of Tunisians leaked to Tel Aviv,” published on the Al-Qatiba website on 30 September 2022.
A six-month period of research and investigation into the global ride app Bolt yielded shocking results about this company: tax evasion, suspicions of money laundering, and even leaking Tunisians’ personal data to Israel due to the way the company operating the app managed to circumvent laws and commit violations with the aim of illegally accumulating profits.
“I had to deal with many restrictions from the very beginning, starting with the violation of my right to access information—and this was at the hand of government institutions”
About two weeks before the publication of my investigative piece, and just one day after Decree 54 was issued, the director of Bolt in Tunisia called me, threatening to sue me according to this new decree. He bragged about the decree’s various articles that could lead to a prison sentence, fully intending to intimidate and harass me and stop me from publishing the investigative piece—all this just as soon as I asked for his email address so I could send him questions and give him the right to respond. I did this in compliance with the dictates of investigative journalistic work and professional ethics, but his response only consisted of threats and intimidation.
That was when I realized that this decree would be used like a sword, hung above journalists’ necks by government officials and power holders to protect illegitimate interests: it thus represents a huge hit to investigative journalism in terms of social accountability, transforming the media into a tool to be manipulated by authorities aiming to manufacture crowds whose only emotion is loyalty.
It didn’t take more than an hour for the tax expert I’d hired for legal explanations of the tax crimes to call me, apologizing and asking that his statements be published anonymously. He claimed to be worried about the new decree and about potentially being arbitrarily dismissed, proving how Decree-law 54 sparked a climate of terror among those concerned with the public sphere, such as journalists and activists, in the very first hours after its circulation—especially Article 24 thereof.
Article 24 of this decree imposes a prison sentence of up to 10 years for internet users, totally contradicting Decree-law 115 of 2011 regulating freedom of expression, which the National Syndicate of Tunisian Journalists adheres to in the cases it considers, bearing in mind that it does not include custodial sentences and is mostly in line with international standards.
The obstacles I faced and threats I received when working on the Bolt investigation were not limited to the above. I had to deal with many other restrictions, from the very beginning, starting with the violation of my right to access information—and this was at the hand of government institutions including the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Communication Technologies, and the Central Bank, all of which refused to answer my request for access to information. As such, they violated the constitutionally guaranteed law and international covenants related to freedom of expression.
In short, this decree constitutes an authoritarian tool impinging on freedom of opinion and expression. This is evident through the trial we are now following of journalist Monia Arfaoui, who works for the newspaper Al-Sabah, after a complaint was filed against her by the Minister of Religious Affairs. The complaint was related to an article in which she raised suspicions of corruption in connection with favoritism and nepotism in the Hajj and Umrah dossier.