Two weeks ago 33-year-old computer programmer Slim Amamou was arrested by Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali's government on suspicion of hacking government websites after government attacks on private Facebook accounts. Now, Ben Ali has fled the country after weeks of riots and Amamou has joined Tunisia's transitional coalition government. Speaking to French radio station Public Senat about his arrest, Amamou said, “It was psychologically very hard, we were deprived of sleep we were handcuffed seated on a chair for five days.” He was released just days before being asked to join the interim government. The Guardian's Angelique Christafia called Amamou's appointment “a sign of the dizzying speed of change in Tunisia.” According to media reports, Amamou was offered the position of Secretary of State for Youth and Sports on Monday, just a day before Tunisia's transitional government was announced, and accepted the offer within minutes. Lydia Leavitt said Amamou's appointment was “born out of his good reputation in the online community.” While the appointment is certainly a mark of the changes happening in Tunisia, not all of Amamou's online peers were pleased with his decision to join the transitional government. Sami Ben Gharbia, an editor at Nawaat, pleaded with Amamou to reconsider via Twitter. “Don't accept to collaborate with those who killed Tunisians, stay clean,” tweeted Gharbia. Amamou has stayed firm about partaking in the government, however, saying that it is only an interim government and it is his duty to partake and report on what happens from inside. Earlier this week, he tweeted that he had already caused a stir with members of the old government by not wearing a tie. A member of Tunisia's ‘Pirate Party,' Amamou is a proponent of net neutrality and was previously detained in May 2010.
