Tunisian President Qais Saeed, Minister of Finance, Siham Al -Bogdiri and Ain Mishkat Al -Khalidi – a judge – sacked a new finance minister.
The presidency said in a statement that Al -Khalidi had performed the oath in front of the president at the Carthage Palace.
Al -Khaldi has been holding the chairman of the Criminal Reconciliation Committee that the president established to try to make reconciliation with businessmen accused of corruption cases in exchange for returning funds for the state.
The dismissal of Al -Bogdiri – which has held the position since 2021 – comes while the public finances in Tunisia face a crisis that led to a shortage of goods, including sugar, rice, coffee and cooking gas.
In an effort to mobilize financial resources, the government raised this year tax owners of moderate and high incomes and resorted to direct borrowing from the central bank at a value of 7 billion dinars (2.2 billion dollars) to pay urgent debts.
Financial Minister Siham Al -Bogdiri said last month that Tunisia needs to pay a debt worth 9 billion dinars in the first quarter of the year 2025, of which 5.1 billion dinars are external debts.
Recent data for the Tunisian Central Bank showed that the country’s foreign exchange reserves fell to 104 days of imports after it paid $ 1.1 billion in external debt.
Tunisia’s foreign exchange reserves fell to 23.325 billion dinars (7.3 billion dollars) compared to 26.701 billion dinars last Thursday.
The Tunisian Central keeps the benefit unchanged
In Tunisia, also the Central Bank announced in a statement today, Wednesday, the maintenance price is unchanged at 8% due to the continued inflationary pressure.
The bank’s board of directors said in the statement that it believes that “the prospects for inflation are still surrounded by escalating risks, and therefore it is necessary to continue to support the countdown path of inflation during the next stage.”
The statement indicated that the inflation rate reached 6.2% last December, compared to 6.6% in its previous November.
The government said that the average inflation would decline to 6.2% by the end of this year from 7% in 2024.
The statement issued after the meeting of the Central Bank’s board of directors that the current scale deficit decreased to 1.7% of the gross domestic product in 2024 compared to 2.3% in 2023.
