Episode 1 – When 3,500 people become “the people”
On Wednesday, December 17, Tunis hosted a demonstration in support of the Kaïs Saïed regime. Around 3,500 people came to say no to foreign interference and yes to the president. Immediately, disciplined social networks and propaganda media spoke of a “popular success”, some even claiming that the people had finally said their word. The President of the Republic took up this lexicon, assimilating without nuance these demonstrators to all the Tunisian people, as if the nation had arranged to meet on Avenue Habib Bourguiba.
Except that reality has this annoying habit of resisting slogans.
This manifestation did not arise spontaneously. It was prepared for weeks. Intensive mobilization on social networks, permanent relays in the media acquired in power, direct involvement of regional deputies, and visible presence of state representatives. On the big day, dozens of buses were parked around Avenue Habib Bourguiba, having transported participants from all over the country. Just with the regional apparatus mobilized – deputies, local networks, institutional support – the number of demonstrators should have been much higher than the 3,500 present.
And yet.
Conversely, the opposition demonstrations observed over the past four Saturdays have not benefited from any state logistics. No buses. No mobilization of deputies, nor delegates, nor omdas. No orchestrated prior campaign. These gatherings were spontaneous, led by citizens who came on their own. The numbers were comparable, sometimes higher, sometimes lower. But never, curiously, did the propaganda media talk about “the people” about them.
Another glaring difference: the nature of the processions. In opposition demonstrations, we meet academics, business leaders, recognized journalists, writers, artists, and community activists. An identifiable, diverse, assertive sociology. On December 17, the show was more street theater than citizen debate. Filmed scenes showed participants literally rolling on the asphalt to proclaim their loyalty, others explaining with confounding seriousness that their illnesses had disappeared since Kaïs Saïed came to power. We were no longer in the political argument, but in the clownish staging. While some express disapproval in measure, others practice devotion in folklore.
Despite this, propaganda media persists. They speak of a “clear message”, of “the people who decide”, of “irrefutable demonstration”. They portray success with emphatic headlines and carefully selected images, as if repeating a lie was enough to turn it into reality.
Supporters of the regime often criticize the opposition for its contempt for the people. The argument is convenient. But the facts are stubborn. Quantitatively, the demonstration of December 17 was nothing exceptional and well below forecasts and the logistics mobilized. Qualitatively, it is above all revealing of a power which confuses fervor and staging, adhesion and caricature.
Kaïs Saïed and his laudators can declare victory, convince themselves that they embody the people and applaud each other. It’s human, after all, to cling to a reassuring illusion. But political history is constant: when a government confuses controlled mobilization and popular support, it is not the people who are wrong. It is power that begins to speak to itself.
Episode 2 – The president forgets those he presides over
The day after the December 17 demonstration, Kaïs Saïed gave a solemn speech — at least according to the triumphalist headlines in certain media — affirming that the Tunisian people had sent a clear message to the nation. He celebrated the mobilization, exalted national sovereignty, spoke of accountability and condemned “the conspirators”.
It’s beautiful, it’s heavy with rhetoric, it almost sounds like a call for national unity.
Presque.
Because in fact, this speech forgets a fundamental constitutional detail: the President of the Republic is not only the president of his laudators, but the president of all Tunisians – including those who rose up Saturday after Saturday to express their disagreement with his policies. Those who responded to the call of democracy, not that of state rhetoric.
The president praised the “collective conscience” and knowledge of the country’s realities, while denouncing mysterious forces against which we should unite.
Yet he did not take a single second to recognize that thousands of citizens — academics, business leaders, journalists, activists, artists — have been demonstrating for several weeks to make another voice heard.
These voices do not fit into the monolithic narrative of “the people”.
One might believe that in a democracy, the clear popular message cannot be the prerogative of a single camp. Let a responsible head of state look beyond the organized ranks of a prepared rally and reflect on the real reasons for the anger and calls for change that echo through the streets every Saturday.
But no: for the Head of State, the people spoke on December 17, and probably not on other days.
This is the most embarrassing oversight of the presidential speech: being the president of those who are against you is just as essential as being the president of those who cheer you. To ignore this reality is to further divide an already fractured nation, to reinforce the idea that certain voices are deemed more “legitimate” than others, and to minimize the very existence of political differences – which is the essence of democratic debate.
Finally, let us remember that the Tunisian people are not a one-dimensional entity. It includes the working classes, of course, but also the elite, the bourgeoisie, the wealthy, intellectuals, entrepreneurs and critical citizens. All are part of the same political community. To exclude them from the definition of the people is to make politics a spectacle, not a democratic representation.
Kaïs Saïed continues his verbiage day after day. But by only looking at those who applaud, he risks forgetting those over whom he actually presides. “The President of All” does not become a reality because it is proclaimed; it becomes so when we include all voices in the public space.
Episode 3 – The invisible people and reinvented stories
If Tunisia were a movie set, Wednesday December 17 in Tunis would have been the main scene of the great film about the Tunisian people. Buses from all regions, social networks bludgeoned for weeks, deputies mobilized as professional extras, everything was there. The official scenario, repeated ad nauseam by the propaganda media, was that 3,500 votes would become the voice of the entire nation – a complete and definitive representation of “the people”. It’s beautiful, it’s powerful, it’s… slightly reductive.
Meanwhile, this same December 17, almost 400 kilometers away, in Gabès, the anger did not wait for the buses or the sponsored hashtags. There we saw a demonstration just as massive as in Tunis, bringing together thousands of people determined to demand concrete solutions to industrial pollution and the failure of the State. A citizen revolt rooted in real suffering, far from official cameras and triumphalist titles. And yet, as if Gabès was not part of Tunisia, as if its inhabitants were not legitimate Tunisians, this mobilization was silenced in the media. Nothing, silence, as if the city and its voices had been erased from the national narrative.
To occupy the empty space left by these silent media, the State brought out a character almost from another film: Ali Ben Hammoud, the petrochemical engineer responsible for developing solutions for Gabès… but whose report seems to have vanished as effectively as the pure air in the city itself. A month and ten days after being received in Carthage and praised for his “sense of national responsibility”, we have seen no concrete action plan, no immediate measures implemented, just a commission well positioned to trigger declarations and communiqués – exactly what you do when you want to give an impression rather than produce change.
When we look closely, this dynamic is symptomatic. The government proclaims a clear popular message from an orchestrated gathering, but ignores or minimizes the other voices of the country: those who demand breathable air, who have been demonstrating for months, who suffer every day from pollution that neither buses nor slogans can mask. The same president who calls himself president of all Tunisians did not consider it useful to integrate into his narrative this citizen pulsation, silent in the media but noisy in the streets of Gabès.
The people therefore seem to have become, in certain dominant narratives, a trademark reserved for those who align with official history — and not a living, plural and sometimes discordant reality. This gap between official Tunisia and living Tunisia continues to widen gaps that rhetoric alone cannot bridge. And as long as this gap remains, the “people with us” narrative will remain a comfortable fable, while the real people will continue to exist off-camera.
