Updated on Jan. 14, 2011, following the overthrow of Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali.
BEN ALI FAMILY
Country: Tunisia
Lifestyle: There are a number of factors that led to the week of street protests and riots that overwhelmed President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali's regime in January 2011, including widespread unemployment, rising food prices, and restrictions on civil liberties. But one major source of Tunisians' widespread rage was the conspicuous consumption of Ben Ali's extended family, particularly the relatives of his second wife, Leila Trabelsi. "No, no to the Trabelsis who looted the budget" was a popular chant among the hundreds of mostly young men who took to the streets of the coastal resort of Hammamet -- where the Trabelsis have built a number of opulent beachfront estates -- as they ransacked mansions, burned all-terrain vehicles, and even liberated a horse from its stable.
The opulent lifestyles of Ben Ali's relatives were laid bare in a series of U.S. diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks, particularly one describing a dinner at the home of his son-in-law, Mohamed Sakhr el-Materi. Materi's Hammamet mansion featured, among other luxuries, "an infinity pool and a terrace of perhaps 50 meters." Roman artifacts, which the host insisted were real, abounded, including a "lion's head from which water pours into the pool." The ambassador and his wife were fed a massive dinner, including more than a dozen dishes and frozen yogurt flown in by plane from Saint-Tropez.
Materi also owned a pet tiger, which he kept in a cage on his compound and consumed four chickens a day. All in all, the situation reminded U.S. Amb. Robert Codec, who had served as an advisor to the transitional government in Iraq and signed the cable, of Uday Hussein's opulent lifestyle.
Not content with buying their own luxuries, Ben Ali's relatives had also taken to appropriating them from others. Another leaked State Department cable describes a 2006 incident in which Imed and Moaz Trabelsi, Ben Ali's nephews through his wife, reportedly stole a $3 million yacht belonging to a prominent French businessman from a dock in Corsica. The yacht reappeared a short time later in a Tunisian port having been repainted to cover its distinguishing characteristics. The French weren't fooled, however, and the yacht was returned to defuse a potential diplomatic uproar. Despite an Interpol warrant being issued for their arrest, the two were never punished.
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