For the fourth year .. Tunisia stopped government employment amid social boiling

Mohamed Ali Latifi - Tunisia

There has been widespread criticism from the allies and opponents of Tunisian Prime Minister Yousef Al-Shahed because of the publication he sent to the state book, ministers and independent constitutional bodies on the draft state budget for 2020, with some expecting to increase protests in the Tunisian street.

The budget publication for the coming year provides for the suspension of government recruitment, with the exception of some urgent mandates. The government of the witness has planned to lay off at least 10,000 employees voluntarily since the start of the program last year, reaching 200,000 by 2020.

According to the new budget publication, the employment freeze policy will be extended for the fourth year in a row, in response to IMF pressure that the wage bloc should be reduced from 15.7 percent of GDP to 12.5 percent next year.

The economist Sadeq Jabbounoun predicted in an interview with Al Jazeera Net that the new draft budget would increase the spread of protests that started in universities and various governorates in order to demand a job. He stressed that the new publication of the budget 2020 came to comply with the new rules, Of the agreement concluded by Tunisia with the International Monetary Fund.

Freezing
"The government of the witness to freeze government employment will face widespread protests in light of its failed development and economic options," warned the spokesman of the Union of Abandoned Certificate Holders, Sharif al-Khraifi.

He added that the unemployed have no choice but to go out on the street and reject the new budget proposals for 2020, and to drop the prime minister's options, which continue the policy of austerity recommendations of the International Monetary Fund.

Al-Kharraifi described "providing protection to vulnerable groups through a database of low-income families in Tunisia" with traditional solutions, in the absence of development projects distributed fairly across the social strata.

Parties' position
The ruling political parties insist on improving the economic indicators of the country, paying attention to the files dealing with inflation and unemployment and the decline in the local currency (dinar), while the opposition parties believe that the rise in unemployment has caused the deterioration of living standards, while social unrest has receded Investments.

"Regardless of the position of the international financial institutions, we see that there is a structural problem in the wage mass within the state budget that requires finding solutions through two options, either to return to work and to improve the gross domestic product or through," said MP Imad al-Fatanasi. Pressure on wages ".

The size of wages in the public service is estimated according to the state budget for 2019, equivalent to 14.1% of the gross domestic product compared to 14% in 2018.

Al-Fantasi pointed out that Tunisia can overcome the financial and economic crisis through the return of many sectors that have experienced an unstable pattern in production such as phosphates and oil due to the increasing protests and providing security for the success of the new tourism year.

The share of phosphates from exports fell to about 4% in 2018, while it accounted for about 10% of Tunisia's exports before 2011, to benefit Morocco - the leading exporters of phosphate - from this decline in production.

On the other hand, the official spokesman of the opposition bloc, Khalil al-Zawya said that the most negative repercussions will include the health sector and education, considering that the dictates of the International Monetary Fund does not serve the social side in the 2020 budget, stressing that the results will be disastrous.

The leader of the opposition Popular Front Ayman al-Alawi said that the pressure on the salaries of employees and the freeze of government employment will increase the size of protests and social unrest in the country, especially as the unemployment rate amounted to more than 15%, according to statistics of the National Institute for Statistics.

Al-Alawi stressed in the same statement the need to revive the developmental aspect and to develop political and development programs in the regions suffering from poverty and marginalization through positive discrimination between the parties in terms of development, investment and employment.

Organizations' concerns
The Tunisian General Union of Labor, the largest union of trade union organizations in the country, which has already declared its dissatisfaction with the budget last year and considered it to threaten the purchasing power of the citizen; renewed his adherence to his position rejecting anything that would affect the purchasing power of the citizen, Al Jazeera Net.

He pointed out that the labor union will not stand idly by in view of the government's inability to face the decline in purchasing power and the rise in inflation to unprecedented levels, especially in view of the increasing migration of Tunisian youth and the increase in poverty and unemployment.

For his part, Tawfiq al-Oreibi, a member of the Organization of Customs, which means defending businessmen, said that the increase in tax revenues is rejected by the Organization of Customs, which hopes that the government will create a security and social environment that encourages investment. The witness to favor the interests of the country, as he put it.