Tunisia's summer of discontent Faisal Edroos on Mon, 08/31/2026 - 12:00 Rolling blackouts plunged entire neighbourhoods into darkness with water shortages sparking fights and raids on supply trucks. With prices rising and jobs scarce, Tunisia's economic malaise is hitting people where it hurts the most Across Tunisia, the question this summer was brutally simple: when will the electricity cut out? For some, the answer was a few times a day, mainly in the dead of the night. But for many, the power outages lasted for hours on end - particularly during the hottest parts of the day. In the middle of the gruelling heatwaves the fans stopped spinning, air conditioners fell silent and the taps ran dry, stark reminders that the state is struggling to provide even the most basic services. For Nadia, the outages were a crisis in their own right. "We can understand that there is a heatwave and that electricity demand is high," the 26-year-old told Middle East Eye. "But what we can't understand is how the government was not prepared." Throughout the summer, Tunisia was gripped by extreme spells of heat, with temperatures reaching the high 40s Celsius (113 Fahrenheit) for successive days. The h
