Tunisia’s president accused of ‘coup’ after sacking prime minister over Covid response

Tunisia’s president accused of ‘coup’ after sacking prime minister over Covid response

Tunisia was facing its biggest political crisis in a decade on Sunday night after the president dismissed the country's prime minister following a day of protests against the ruling party, in what critics have described as a "coup." "We have taken these decisions... until social peace returns to Tunisia and until we save the state," said President Kais Saied as he announced that he was invoking the constitution to sack prime minister Hichem Mechichi and his government. In the capital of Tunis, hundreds defied a coronavirus curfew to gather in the roads, waving the Tunisian flag and setting off fireworks to celebrate the prime minister's dismissal. "Finally some good decisions!" Maher, one of those on the streets, told AFP. But the ruling Ennahda party and its supporters have claimed that the emergency suspension of the prime minister and parliament amounts to a coup. "What Kais Saied is doing is a coup d'etat against the revolution and against the constitution, and the members of Ennahda and the Tunisian people will defend the revolution," the party countered in a statement on Facebook. The premier's office had not responded to his sacking on Sunday night. Earlier on Sunday, thousands of Tunisians took the