He defends himself against all racism. Tunisian President Kais Saied has denied discrimination against sub-Saharan Africans after an outcry over his inflammatory speech against illegal migrants in his country. On February 21, Kais Saied claimed that the presence of “hordes” of illegal immigrants from sub-Saharan Africa was a source of “violence and crime” and part of a “criminal enterprise” aimed at “changing the demographic composition”. from the country.
After this speech, condemned by NGOs as “racist and hateful”, nationals of sub-Saharan Africa reported an upsurge in attacks against them and rushed by the dozens to their embassies to be repatriated. In an apparent concern for appeasement, Kais Saied affirmed during an interview with the President of Guinea-Bissau Umaro Sissoco Embalo, who was stopping over in Tunis, that the Africans present in Tunisia were “brothers”, according to a video broadcast by the Tunisian presidency.
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Affirming that the objective of his speech was to enforce “Tunisian legality concerning foreigners” and to prevent any “jurisdiction parallel to state jurisdictions”, he rejected the “malicious remarks” of those who “wanted interpret the speech as they please to harm Tunisia”.
21,000 nationals from sub-Saharan Africa in the country
“This situation concerning Africans cannot be interpreted by malevolent tongues, as they have been doing in recent days, as racism. What are they talking about ? They ramble,” he added. “I am African and I am proud to be so,” he said.
Umaro Sissoco Embalo, current president of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) spoke of a “misinterpretation” of Kais Saied’s speech on sub-Saharan migrants, saying he could not believe that “the president of Tunisia, the country of (Habib) Bourguiba, can be xenophobic or racist”.
The African Union had condemned “shocking” statements, calling on member countries to “refrain from any racist hate speech”. According to official figures, Tunisia has more than 21,000 nationals of sub-Saharan African countries, the majority in an irregular situation, or less than 0.2% of a total population of around 12 million.