The acting director general of the Coastal Protection and Development Agency (Apal), Mehdi Belhaj, confirmed that the hill of Sidi Bou Said, a picturesque and tourist village northeast of Tunis, is threatened by landslides. ground. And not only that… It is not possible, at present, to assess the level of danger and the degree of expected landslides without a precise diagnosis of the situation, added Belhaj, explaining, in an interview with the Tap agency, that the crumbling of the hill from below is caused by marine erosion. The official said that the top of the hill is also at risk of sliding, as it begins to be eroded by rainwater, pointing out that there are landslides under the Ennejma Ezzahra Palace, headquarters of the Center for Arab and Mediterranean Music ( Cmam).
Belhaj warned of violations noted in the construction of some residences on the hill that aggravate this imminent danger, stressing that, during a preliminary inspection carried out at the end of 2023, doubts focused on other factors causing of this danger, such as water leaks, irrigation water and swimming pool water. The head of Apal indicated, in the same context, that the agency launched a call for tenders during the month of April 2024 to carry out a technical study lasting six months including the diagnosis, solutions and the estimate of the cost and duration of the consolidation work, specifying having obtained, from the Ministry of Finance, funding of 400,000 dinars for this study. The study will help identify appropriate geotechnical solutions to consolidate the hill, Belhaj stressed, adding that work will begin after determining the type of interventions, including probably the erection of stone dikes. The intervention program will concern the entire hill, but it will start with the most vulnerable areas. In this regard, he declared that a partial intervention had already taken place on the plateau between 2002 and 2004 and that the danger remained present, stressing that the agency had alerted of it during the year 2016, but that the question had not been included in the five-year plan at that time.
Note that a technical working session took place on January 29, 2024 at the headquarters of the commune of Sidi Bou Saïd, under the direction of the Minister of Agriculture, Hydraulic Resources and Fisheries, Abdelmonem Belati, and was dedicated to examining practical solutions to landslides on the hill of Sidi Bou Saïd and the surroundings of the Ennejma Ezzahra palace, and involved all stakeholders. It should be noted that Sidi Bou Said is a tourist suburb located 20 km northeast of Tunis. The village is considered the first protected site in the world, and its foundation dates back to the Middle Ages. It is located at the top of the rocky slope overlooking Carthage and the Gulf of Tunis. Tunisia is seeking to include the historic village of Sidi Bou Saïd on the UNESCO world heritage list. She dedicated a working session to the Ministry of Cultural Affairs, on March 2, 2024, to discuss this possibility.
