---
title: "Tunisia’s Unemployed Graduates Demand a Hiring Plan as Their Rate Hits 26.6%"
description: "Police stopped their march on the capital at Borj Cedria on Oct. 6, and a 2025 law promising them public jobs still has no timetable."
author: "rews desk"
published: 2026-10-18T04:14:42Z
modified: 2026-10-18T15:50:53Z
url: https://rews.cc/a/tunisia-s-unemployed-graduates-demand-a-hiring-plan-as-their-906aa7
language: en
tags: ["economy", "unemployment", "politics", "saied", "protests", "world"]
publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)"
---

# Tunisia’s Unemployed Graduates Demand a Hiring Plan as Their Rate Hits 26.6%

*Police stopped their march on the capital at Borj Cedria on Oct. 6, and a 2025 law promising them public jobs still has no timetable.*

By rews desk · October 18, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/tunisia-s-unemployed-graduates-demand-a-hiring-plan-as-their-906aa7

## In brief

- Unemployment among Tunisian university graduates rose to 26.6% in the second quarter of 2026, up from 24.2%
- The rate was 35.6% for women graduates and 14.2% for men, while overall unemployment eased to 14.9%
- Police stopped the graduates’ Dignity March at Borj Cedria, south of Tunis, on Oct. 6
- Marchers want a hiring timetable under Law No. 18 of 2025, which allows up to three years for phased public hiring
- Thousands protested against President Kais Saied in Tunis on Saturday in the largest such rally in years

Unemployed Tunisian university graduates, whose march on the capital was stopped by police this month, are demanding a hiring timetable under a 2025 law as unemployment among graduates rose to 26.6 percent.

That rate, from the National Institute of Statistics, covers the second quarter of 2026. It was up from 24.2 percent in the first quarter, which was itself up from 22.5 percent, [according to African Manager](https://en.africanmanager.com/tunisia-unemployment-falls-to-14-9-in-q2-2026/). Women with degrees are hit hardest: 35.6 percent of them were out of work, compared with 14.2 percent of male graduates.

The headline figure looked better. Overall unemployment slipped to 14.9 percent from 15 percent, but part of that came from a labor force that shrank by 77,500 people in a single quarter. Unemployment among those aged 15 to 24 was 35.4 percent, down from 37.5 percent.

The graduates set out on Sept. 27 from Menzel Bouzaiane in central Tunisia on what they called the Dignity March, a walk of about 300 kilometers (186 miles) toward Tunis. Twenty-three people started, according to the organizers, and the coordinating committee later estimated that more than 120 had joined along the way. Some stopped at points with exhaustion and injuries.

On Oct. 6, police blocked the group in Borj Cedria, south of the capital. Participants said they were told they could go on individually but not together. They had wanted to reach Carthage, the suburb where the presidential palace sits.

![Seven travelers face a guarded road barrier in a desert landscape, with a city skyline and setting sun in the distance.](https://rews.cc/img/aebea8fafe6cf6cda136a9503f378174734575f5.webp)

One of them, Cherine Ghanmi, grew up in al-Mazzunah, a poor town in Sidi Bou Zid governorate, and walked five kilometers to a school her parents could barely afford, [Al Jazeera reported](https://aljazeera.com/economy/2026/10/18/tunisias-economic-crisis-deepens-as-the-promise-of-a-better-life-fades). She graduated in 2012 and has not found a job since. She still depends on her parents.

“We studied and graduated believing we had finally found a way out of poverty,” Ms. Ghanmi said. “Unfortunately, reality was a big shock for us. Instead of helping them, we have burdened them even more.”

The marchers want a plan for Law No. 18 of 2025, which provides for the exceptional hiring of long-term unemployed graduates into the public sector and civil service. It took effect when it was published in the Official Gazette on Dec. 23, 2025. Article 6 says the hiring will happen in phases over no more than three years, and the law calls for a digital platform to register applicants and rules for ranking them. The graduates say they have been given no practical arrangements and no schedule.

They have been here before. An earlier measure, Law No. 38 of 2022, was meant to open a path to jobs for the same group and stalled for lack of money.

![A seated graduate holding a diploma faces a giant hourglass containing office chairs, against an orange sunset with long shadows.](https://rews.cc/img/ff79bb010419a40b2c72ac0f28e7df55cf564221.webp)

“Almost all the governments that succeeded one another after the \[2011\] revolution did not make the economic situation, development and the treatment of social issues real priorities,” said Cherif Khraifi, a spokesman for the Tunisian Union of Higher Education Graduates. “Their biggest concern was ensuring they stayed in power.” Mr. Khraifi said such measures had too often been “tools for letting off steam” and that public hiring alone could not absorb the jobless without private investment, which is scarce in the poorer regions.

Ms. Ghanmi has little faith in President Kais Saied’s community-based companies, local ventures he promotes as a source of jobs. “The authorities insist on promoting community companies as a solution for jobs and development, yet none of these companies managed to do that,” she said.

The graduates’ complaints were part of a larger protest on Saturday, when thousands marched in Tunis against Mr. Saied in [the largest demonstration against him in years](https://www.arabnews.pk/middle-east/tunisians-stage-biggest-protest-in-years-against-president-saied-3004446), Reuters reported. The UGTT labor union led it, with [opposition parties across the spectrum](https://rews.cc/a/tunisia-s-opposition-finally-marches-together-with-the-labou-a616ec). “Enough is enough! The country is collapsing. We suffer from power and water cuts, and one crisis after another,” Yassine Gharseli, a protester from Sfax, told Reuters. Mr. Saied, who took broad powers in 2021, denies that he is a dictator and has accused his opponents of engineering economic crises to stir unrest.

![A giant dry faucet towers over a parched landscape, casting a shadow filled with raised-arm silhouettes toward a distant city beneath an orange sunset.](https://rews.cc/img/8f6e4835c819ca0e614a3e4d447d7350641ee9d1.webp)

The economy grew 2.7 percent in 2025 and 2.4 percent in the first half of 2026, according to the statistics institute. In September, the World Bank projected 2.3 percent for this year.

Anis Ben Said, a tax adviser and university professor, said the country’s “problem is not a lack of skills, but the economy’s inability to turn skills into production, investment and job opportunities.” He blamed weak investment and the poor upkeep of public infrastructure. “The financial crisis explains part of the problem, but it does not justify all of it,” Mr. Ben Said said.

This summer, extreme heat came with power cuts and water shortages in several regions. In L’Aouina, a northern suburb of Tunis, a 20-year-old barber named Khalil said he was waiting for a chance to leave by boat. “There’s nothing worth staying for in this country. Dying at sea would be a relief,” he said.

Ms. Ghanmi said the years without work had done more than drain her family’s money. “The wound on the body heals, but the wound in the mind and heart does not heal,” she said. “It really does not heal.”