With our correspondent in Tunis, Amira Souilem
Midi Show is the iconic midday radio show in Tunisia. Every day, the team of four journalists dissects the latest news from the country. But since Monday, February 13, day of the station manager’s arrestthe atmosphere is a little heavy.
Elyès Gharbi, in charge of the program since the fall of Ben Ali in 2011, has the impression of being in a moment of seesaw:
« Today, this serenity is still a little shaken. She is deeply shaken when you have a channel boss who is imprisoned and questioned about the radio’s editorial line, the choices of journalists, the choices of columnists… So frankly, that’s where you lose your footing. Because we don’t understand why we end up justifying our own profession. It raises extremely deep questions about the profession and about democracy and about Tunisia’s choices at the moment. »
As if nothing had happened, Haythem El Mekki, the satirical journalist of the show, still presents his press review which does not spare President Kais Saied. He says :
« How exactly it will end, we don’t know. We feel more electricity in the air. But we try to make a kind of demonstration: even if the director is in prison, that does not mean that we will change our way of working, our opinions, nor our way of seeing things. »
To date, no official information on the reasons for the arrest of Noureddine Boutar, the general manager of the station, has been made public.
► To read also: Press freedom: in Tunis, journalists denounce an unbreathable climate