Brûlée vive by his ex-husband on October 29, Wafa Essbii had taken the steps for a protective order, without this being applied.
by Lilia Blaise (Kef, Tunisia, Special Envoy)
When Wejdane Essbii, 33, receives a call from her brother, on October 29, from their hometown of Kef, in the northwest of Tunisia, she does not immediately understand the drama that has just taken place. “There was a fire with our sister, you have to come,” he said. She, Wafa, a 40-year-old teacher, was beaten and burned long in her ex-husband, whom she had just divorced four days earlier.
“The medical examiner told us that she had not suffered from burns because she was apparently already unconscious because of the blows, when he set fire to her body,” said Wejdane Essbii in a voice Trembling, still incapable of conceiving “this unimaginable act”.
The family says they have not been aware of the violence within this couple, parents of two teenagers. Wafa Essbii had announced a year earlier her intention to divorce her husband, a customs agent, but without giving explanations. “She was very discreet and asked us to respect the fact that it was a private affair. I think she tried to preserve her children to the end,” insists her sister, a doctor in the Samu in Tunis.
An emblematic case
This murder sparked a wave of anger with Tunisian feminist organizations who organized a white march at KEF on Saturday November 5. A tribute to the victim but also the expression of a fed up in the face of failures in the application of the law on violence against women, voted in 2017. In the Kef region, this is the third feminicide in one year. In May 2021, the death of Refka Cherni killed by her husband when she had just filed a complaint for violence had aroused outcry throughout the country.
Karima Brini, president of the local association woman and citizenship at the kef and present at the March 5 march, which brought together around fifty women and a handful of men, deplores the lack of change since the death of Refka Cherni. “There is always a problem in applying the protection mechanisms provided for by law,” she said. She admits that the case has still improved the responsiveness of the prosecution: “The substitute for the prosecutor quickly starts provisional emergency protection measures and almost 75 % of the requests of the victims who pass through us are treated”, adds -Is.
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