TUNIS 84 n
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TUNIS.
(Afrikita.)
Government. — Sidi Mohamed Ben Nasr Bey, born 1855, son of Mohamerl Pasha Bey, nephew of Sidi AH, former Bey of Tunis ; succeeded his cousin. Sidi Mahomed el Hadi, May 12, 1906. The heir-presumptive is Sidi Mohamed Ben Mainoun Bey, born 1858.
The reigning family of Tunis, occupants of the throne since 1705, descend from Husseim ben Ali, commonly believed to be a native of the Lsle of Crete, who made himself master of the country, acknowledging, however, the suzerainty of the Sultan of Turkey.
After the French invasion of the country in the spring of 1881, the treaty of Kasr-es-Said (May 12, 1881), confirmed by convention signed June 8, 1883, placed Tunis under the protectorate of France. The government is carried on under the direction of the French Foreign Office, which has a special de- partment for Tunisian affairs, under the control of a French Minister Resident- General, who is also Minister of Foreign Affairs, and a ministry of 9 heads of departments, 7 of the ministers being French and 2 Tunisian. The country is divided into 13 districts (controles civils), 2 military circles, and 1 military post ; the district governors (controleurs) are French ; tlie subordinate oflficials (Raids and Sheiks) are Native. French tribunals administer justice between subjects of European powers, and also between them and natives ; there are Native courts for cases between natives. French administration in Tunis has been confirmed by conventions with all the European Powers regulating the status and the conditions of trade of their respective citizens within the Regency.
French Resident-General. — Gabriel Alapetite.
The army of occupation for 1913 numbers 17,514 men, including 690 officers. The cost of maintaining this force is borne by the budget of the Republic, and is estimated for 1913 at 1,198,924 francs. The Tunisian army (which is little more than the Bey's guard) numbers about 600 officers and men. There is a French gendarmerie of 139 ; also rural Tunisian police, and in. the larger towns a civil police.
Area and Population. — The present boundaries are : on the north and east the Mediterranean Sea, on the west the Franco-Algerian province of Constantine, and on the south the great desert of the Sahara and the Turkish Pashalik of Tripoli. Area about 50, 000 English square miles, including that portion of the Sahara which is to the east of the.Beled Djerid, extending towards Gadames. Population, in 1910, about 1,923J217, but no proper census has ever been taken. The majority of the population consists of Bedouin Arabs and Kabyles with about 50,000 Jews. The French population in 1911 was estimated as 46,044, exclusive of the axmj of occupation. The foreign popula- tion in 1911 was estimated as 148,476, of wliom 88,082 were Italian, 11,300 Anerlo-Maltese.
