La Presse de Tunisie was founded in 1934[2] by Henri Smadja, a Tunisian and French Jewish doctor and lawyer, born in Tunisia, who became the owner of the daily newspaper Combat. The paper, based in Tunis,[3] was close to the Constitutional Democratic Rally.[1] Its sister paper is Arabic newspaper Assahafah.[2] Before the 2010-2011 Tunisian protestsLa Presse de Tunisie was published by a state-owned publishing company.[4]
As a result of these protests, the newspaper transformed from being seen as propaganda for Zine El Abidine Ben Ali's government to having editorial independence from the government.[5] However, the owner of the daily is the government of Tunisia,[3][6] more specifically the state-owned company SNIPE.[2]
In addition, the president of the paper, Mohammad Nejib Ouerghi, worked for state-owned newspapers before the deportation of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.[7]
