A Tunisian presidential candidate challenging President Kais Saied in the upcoming election has been sentenced to prison on fraud charges that his lawyer claims are politically motivated.
Ayachi Zammel, leader of Tunisia’s Azimoun party, received a 20-month prison sentence from a court in Jendouba on Wednesday for allegedly falsifying signatures on his candidacy papers.
Zammel, a businessman and one of two candidates running against Saied in the October 6 election, was arrested two weeks before his sentencing.
He faces over 20 additional charges across Tunisia, including four more cases scheduled for court hearings on Thursday.
Zammel’s lawyer, Abdessattar Messaoudi, condemned the verdict, stating that Zammel would continue his campaign from behind bars despite what he described as ongoing harassment since the announcement of his candidacy.
The crackdown on Saied’s opponents has intensified ahead of the October election. Last month, two other candidates, Nizar Chaari and Karim Gharbi, were sentenced on similar fraud charges related to signature falsification. Additionally, Abdellatif El Mekki, one of three candidates reinstated to the ballot by court order after initially being ruled ineligible, was arrested in connection with a 2014 murder investigation that critics argue is politically driven.
Prominent opposition figures such as Abir Moussi of the Free Destourian Party and Rached Ghannouchi of the Islamist Ennahda party have also been imprisoned since last year, further highlighting the contentious pre-election environment in Tunisia. Civil liberty advocates and international organisations, including Amnesty International, have criticised these actions as indicative of Tunisia’s democratic decline, labelling them a targeted assault on human rights and the rule of law.
