It seems that Saied’s discourse is working. Several hundred demonstrators protested on Sunday in Sfax against the presence of illegal sub-Saharan migrants. The city is Tunisia’s second-largest and is the nation’s economic center and main departure point for migrants heading for Italy.
Protesters assembled in front of the city’s prefecture at the suggestion of the “Sayeb trottoir” local movement, according to an AFP journalist. The presence of illegal migrants, according to the movement’s head, Zied Mallouli, is a threat to the safety of the people of Sfax.
Sfax residents have frequently decried the rising number of illegal immigrants and have called for their removal.
Protests against the presence of illegal immigrants in Tunisia have grown following President Kais Saied’s address on February 21 criticizing illegal immigration as a demographic danger to his country.
Several local and international NGOs subsequently condemned what they considered to be “hate speech and intimidation against migrants (from Sub-Saharan Africa) disseminated on social media, which contribute to mobilization against the most vulnerable groups and fuel violent behavior against them.”
In late May, a 30-year-old migrant from Benin was stabbed to death by a group of Tunisian youths in a working-class neighborhood of Sfax.