
The Tunisian National Office for Tourism has teamed up with the country's own Star Wars fan club to stage its first Star Wars encounter in the country. Participating fan clubs from Europe will feature the parade in the capital and then film screenings and events in Tunisia's deep south, home of the sets from several Star Wars movies. by Paul Schemm and Bouazza Ben Bouazza
Imperial stormtroopers are set to march through Tunisia's capital as part of a new effort to attract tourists and burnish the image of this North African country.
Related
Their parade ground is downtown Tunis' stately, tree-lined Bourguiba Avenue, where young activists fought squads of riot police in 2011 during their Arab Spring revolution.
Wednesday's parade is not a case of the empire striking back against the poster child for Arab democracy in North Africa, however, but part of an innovative new campaign to bring tourists back to this sunny nation.
We did this campaign to take advantage of these sets which are unique in the world - the only sites from the movies remaining, said Zied Chargui, director of the National Office of Tunisian Tourism and one of the brains behind the new efforts to attract tourism that go beyond subway billboards in European capitals.
The campaign began with Tunisia's own video of recording artist Pharrell Williams' wildly popular Happy song, featuring Star Wars characters dancing around Tunisian tourist sites and the sand-covered desert movie sets.
The video has been viewed 1.7 million times since it was posted in March and was tweeted by Williams himself.
It created a global buzz which makes us very happy, said Chargui, saying the idea was to remind the world that Tunisia's has more attractions aside from beach resorts. We will try to keep working on this idea up until the release of the 2015 film, he said referring to the seventh episode of the franchise expected next year.
The original 1977 Star Wars was filmed in Tunisia, with protagonist Luke Skywalker's home planet borrowing its name of the nearby town of Tatouine. New sets were built for the 1999 Phantom Menace episode as well as its 2002 sequel but the new film will not be filming in Tunisia, apparently over concerns with stability. Some scenes are now being shot in Abu Dhabi.
After President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was overthrown in 2011, Tunisia was rocked by labor unrest, terrorist attacks and political assassinations, which devastated the key tourism sector.
In the past few months, there has been a return to stability, and a renewed effort to bring back tourists. Contributing 7 percent of GDP and employing 400,000 people, the sector is considered key to saving the country's battered economy.
Tourist numbers have been gradually rising since the industry nearly collapsed in 2011 but the 6.2 million arrivals in 2013 are still 9 percent less than 2010. The latest campaign seeks to publicize desert tourism and, of course the Star Wars sets.
It's our first convention and we will see if we can make it annual, said Abderrahman Ameur, the director of Tunisia's year-and-a-half-old Star Wars fan club who worked with the tourism office on the campaign. We met, we talked about what we could do and we did some brainstorming.
Folded into the campaign is an effort to save one of the sets which is slowly being engulfed by a roving sand dune. Started by a local tourism organization, the campaign includes a crowdsourcing website seeking to raise $188,000 to clear away the dune and restore the fictional settlement of Mos Espa from the 1999 film - near the Tunisian town of Tozeur.
Chargui, the head of the tourism office, said that the campaign is only the first in a series of new promotion plans coming from his office.
There are many young Tunisians with many ideas and when we finish with Star Wars, then you will see others, he said.
http://www.chieftain.com
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
02/05/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
01/05/2026
January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...
01/04/2026
January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION
Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...
09/03/2026
Foos Gone Wild and Combate Global have teamed up to create a twist on combat sports competition, announcing the launch of a special amateur Mixed Martial Arts (...
09/03/2026
At the 2026 NAB Show, Harmonic will introduce significant enhancements to its video appliances and SaaS solutions, highlighted by a next-generation media server...
09/03/2026
ESPN's March 3 spring training matchup between Team USA and the San Francisc...
09/03/2026
Most Valuable Promotions (MVP) announces the launch of MVPW, a new global platfo...
09/03/2026
Behind The Mic provides a roundup of recent news regarding on-air talent, includ...
09/03/2026
From Super Bowl compounds to Final Four setups, the Hofstra graduate helps coord...
09/03/2026
Stamford plays a key role, but a small team in Cortina and Milan powers local presence and mixed-zone coverage...
09/03/2026
The event brings together SVG's previous Cloud Production and Content Management Forums into a single, comprehensive day of programming...
09/03/2026
Updated Mar 9, 2026
Live surround sound has been a part of the plan for Roman a...
09/03/2026
Contains all six dual-ensemble libraries
VSL's Duality Strings series offers an intriguing alternative to your average string library, capturing two str...
09/03/2026
Outstanding Contribution To UK Music
Photo: Samuel Bradley
Ahead of their upcoming MPG Awards, the Music Producers Guild (MPG) have revealed the latest win...
09/03/2026
Two new high-quality DI boxes announced
Boasting some impressive technical specifications and versatile routing options, Strymon's latest active DI boxe...
09/03/2026
Latest MPE-capable Soundbox library released
The follow-up release for Sonora Cinematic's Pure Nylon has arrived, and becomes the latest addition to the...
09/03/2026
Popular wireless mic head design revived
Sennheiser have revealed that the MD 9235, a cardioid mic head designed to pair up with their handheld wireless sys...
09/03/2026
Captures two sought-after Dumble combo amps
The latest TONEX release captures a pair of sought-after Dumble amplifiers from IK Multimedia's private amp ...
09/03/2026
Flexible all-analogue insert matrix joins line-up
HUM Audio Devices don't tend to do things by halves - even the quickest of glances at the likes of the...
09/03/2026
Captures three sought-after pianos
Rhodes latest software release brings together a collection of three virtual pianos: a concert grand, an acoustic upright...
09/03/2026
Flagship compressor gets an upgrade
Techivation's flagship compressor plug-in has just been treated to a ground-up rebuild that kits it out with some po...
09/03/2026
Profiler OS 14.0 enters open beta
Kemper's amp-modelling systems already have a great reputation, but the latest update to their systems' underlying...
09/03/2026
Procedural stems smasher & recomposition engine
Blinksonic have recently launched a new Reaktor-based tool which they say takes a radical departure from yo...
09/03/2026
13 - 15 March 2026 at University of Warwick Conference Centre
The Institute of Professional Sound (IPS) have announced that The IPS Training Weekend 2026 wi...
09/03/2026
Rohde & Schwarz and NETGEAR collaborate for next generation Wi-Fi 8 access point...
09/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
09/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
09/03/2026
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and monetization at scale, will showcase its latest innovations for broadcasters and streaming platforms at NAB Show 2026 (boot...
09/03/2026
UKTV has agreed a new partnership deal with Samsung that makes UKTV's free linear channels available to internet-only Samsung TV viewers in the UK for the f...
09/03/2026
Monday 9 March 2026
Sky reveals first look trailer and sets premiere date for S...
09/03/2026
Monday 9 March 2026
Sky Appoints Damian Saunders as Managing Director of Sky Business
Sky has today announced the appointment of Damian Saunders as Managing D...
09/03/2026
Back to All News
The Predator of Seville premieres on Netflix on 27 March
Entertainment
09 March 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Download the im...
09/03/2026
Back to All News
Netflix Debuts the Trailer for Love is Blind: Sweden Season 3
Entertainment
09 March 2026
GlobalSweden
Link copied to clipboard
That wait...
09/03/2026
Bill O'Reilly Announces New Weekly Podcast We'll Do It LIVE! We'll Do It LIVE!' A Bold, Fresh Presentation from Bill O'Reilly
New York...
09/03/2026
MOSOLF SE & Co. KG Relies on green.screen from Arvato Systems for Strategic Ener...
09/03/2026
A powerful new national initiative supporting people living with dementia launch...
09/03/2026
AI is everywhere and accelerating everything - becoming essential infrastructure...
09/03/2026
ABB Robotics and NVIDIA today announced a breakthrough partnership that brings i...
07/03/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
06/03/2026
TNT Sports and the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) have reached a mul...
06/03/2026
OffBall and TOGETHXR, two influential young media companies in sports, announce a strategic and operational partnership in a shared push to scale and create inn...
06/03/2026
InfoComm 2026, a destination for AV, IT, broadcast, and AI-driven systems, annou...
06/03/2026
LTN and MediaKind announce a strategic partnership to integrate MediaKind's ...
06/03/2026
X Games and the Greater New Orleans Sports Foundation (GNOSF) announce that New Orleans, Louisiana, will host the first-ever X Games Championship event - the fi...
06/03/2026
As part of a busy start of the year at Chyron, the AXIS team developed a set of improvements for AXIS Maps. The features released empower users with more flexib...
06/03/2026
At the 2026 NAB Show, BeckTV, a premier systems integrator for the broadcast ind...
06/03/2026
At NAB Show 2026, Net Insight introduces Nimbra Live Intelligence, which definin...
06/03/2026
SES announces that it has added new Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellite capacity ...