Tunisian athletes go to Europe without authorization
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Salma Hossein
- . April 12, 2023
- . Update: April 12, 2023 10:48 pm
Following the illegal immigration of 32 of its players to Europe, a Tunisian football club announced on Tuesday that it had halted operations.
The president of the fourth-division Ghardimaou club, Jamil Meftahi, blamed “clandestine emigration” and stated on Tuesday, “We’ve halted activities and suspended our matches.” 32 of the club’s players had moved to Europe in the last three years, he claimed.
Numerous Tunisians have been forced to resort to desperate tactics in order to leave their country for a better life due to the country’s protracted, deteriorating economic crisis.
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The Ghardimaou players, who ranged in age from 17 to 22, “either left by sea or went via Serbia then illegally crossed the border into other countries,” according to Meftahi.
Prior to November of last year, Tunisians were permitted to visit Serbia without a visa, providing thousands of people with an alternative to the world’s most dangerous migrant route—risky boat crossings in the Central Mediterranean.
The underprivileged communities like Ghardimaou, an interior rural region close to the Algerian border but removed from Tunisia’s coastal economic centers, have produced a disproportionate amount of people who are leaving.
Meftahi attributed the players’ defection to their “lack of financial means.”
The players aren’t getting paid, and we can’t buy shoes, shirts, or equipment, he claimed.
Many Tunisians and residents of sub-Saharan African nations have already attempted the trip this year because portions of the Tunisian coast are just 150 km from the Italian island of Lampedusa.
