A member of the Maltese community in Tunis who wrote a book about Maltese migrants in Tunisia has won the Prix Maghreb Mediterranee.

Claude Rizzo was born in Bab el Khadra, the Maltese enclave in Tunis, in 1943. He left in 1961 but says he never really left it since it has always been present in his mind and in his writings.

He is the author of many books: Une épidémie ordinaire, Au temps du Jasmin, Et les arbres chuchotaient, Je croyais que tout était fini, Tunisie de notre enfance and his best known novel Le Maltais de Bab el-Khadra.

In this book he desribes Bab el Khadra, one of the most densely populated areas in Tunis where Arabs, Jews, Italians and Maltese live in harmony and share the same poverty.

Little Gaetan Vella, an eight-year-old orphan, refuses to become a cab driver like most Maltese. He wants to become a manager and, in a way, he already has his own company, a group of friends who live off the elderly in the area.

But this is not enough: one must be educated in order to succeed. Happily, there is Aunt Menouna, an old toothless spinster who dotes on young, ambitious children. It is through her that Gaetan gets to know the history of his ancestors and discovers the fascination for his land of origin as well as his love of France.

Meanwhile, as people are coming out of the mosques, the criers announce the end of a world, the strikes and demonstrations multiply, violence increases and soon Tunis wakes up to bombs.

It’s 1954 and autonomy is declared. Gaetan too has won a sort of victory, he enters sixth form.

Mr Rizzo is to give a conference on Saturday 20 January at 6pm at the cultural club Tahar Haddad in the Medina in Tunis.

This initiative is part of the Maltese Friday series in the Maltese month organised to celebrate Tunisian-Maltese friendship, an initiative of the Maltese embassy with the cooperation of the Tunisian Ministry for Culture and the Safeguarding of Heritage, the City of Tunis and the universities of La Manouba and Malta.