A Tunisian court on Friday sentenced the head of the "Dignity Coalition" bloc in the dissolved parliament, Seif El-Din Makhlouf, to one year in prison and banned him from practicing law for five years, while Ennahda movement condemned the "violence" against the opposition and referred opponents to military courts.
Makhlouf is considered one of the prominent opponents of President Qais Saeed, who is facing increasing opposition since the exceptional measures he took last year, and his dissolution of parliament and ruling by republican decrees, in a move his opponents described as a "coup".
The former brigadier general of lawyers, Abdul Razzaq Al-Kilani, a member of Makhlouf's defense team, said - in a statement to the press - that the Military Court of Appeal "has issued a ruling today, imprisoning Makhlouf, with effect, and depriving him of practicing the legal profession for 5 years."
Al-Kilani added that the verdict "is not final and is subject to appeal in the (Kulwar) case related to Makhlouf's accusation of "insulting and threatening a military judge in the corridor of the military investigation at the headquarters of the Permanent Military Court of First Instance in Tunis."
For his part, lawyer Samir Dilo, a member of Makhlouf's defense team, said - in a post on his Facebook account - that the verdict issued against his client came "without pleadings and after receiving a request for delay from the lawyers, provided that this is decided upon after negotiation." An indication that the court did not hear the defense.
In turn, Anwar Awlad Ali, Makhlouf's lawyer, commented on the ruling by saying that what happened was "a real farce.. this is the judiciary that Saeed wants.. a judiciary under his control.. a judiciary targeting his opponents and opponents."
It is noteworthy that on February 18, a Tunisian court sentenced Makhlouf to a one-year prison sentence with a delay in execution.
The Renaissance Movement
On the other hand, the Tunisian Ennahda movement condemned the "physical or verbal violence" being subjected to the leadership of the Tunisian Labor Union and party leaders, as well as the "addiction" of the authority to refer political opponents to military courts.
"We renew our support for the judges in their battle to impose the independence of the judiciary," Ennahda said in a statement.
The statement also denounced "the efforts of the coup authority through the electoral commission to criminalize the referendum boycotters," as he put it.
Earlier this year, President Saeed appointed a temporary judicial council to replace the Supreme Judicial Council, which has been the main guarantor of judicial independence since the 2011 revolution that opened the door to democracy.
In early June, he dismissed dozens of judges, accusing them of "corruption and protecting terrorists", in a move that the judges' unions said would allow him to influence the judiciary and create vacancies to appoint his loyalists.