La Presse de Tunisie as propaganda for Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's government to having editorial independence from the government. However, the owner of the daily is the government of Tunisia, more specifically the state-owned company SNIPE. In addition, the president of the paper, Mohammad Nejib Ouerghi, worked for state-owned newspapers before the deportion of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. La Presse de Tunisie La Presse, founded in 1934, is a large-circulation French-language daily newspaper published in Tunis, Tunisia. "La Presse de Tunisie" was founded in 1934 by Henri Smadja, a Tunisian and French Jewish doctor and lawyer, born in Tunisia, who went on
Leïla Ben Ali daughter of a dried fruit seller to First Lady. Prior to her 1992 marriage to Ben Ali, she was a hairdresser with little formal education, partying hard in Paris. She was married for three years to Khelil Maaouia. She then had an affair with industrial magnate, Farid Mokhtar, a friend of the Prime Minister who introduced her to the highest levels of Tunisian society. After her romantic relationship and subsequent marriage to Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, she and her family rose to prominent positions in Tunisian business and became noted for their greed, power and ruthlessness. Leila