For the launch of his campaign on Thursday 15 August, three weeks before the early presidential elections scheduled for Saturday 7 September, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune painted the picture of a State on the brink of the abyss, victim of various plots, saved by his action. According to him, before coming to power, the Algerian State had “collapsed”the economy “collapsed” AND The country was the subject of “sabotage”. Then he said, “shortage” were allegedly orchestrated and the forest fires “knowingly provoked” in summer 2021 “in a state known for its hostility towards the country”without directly naming Morocco. He also claimed to have “We achieved results that saved the country” and assured that“Algeria’s word is heard abroad today”before ordering ” trust “ Algerians to continue their mission.
Abdelmadjid Tebboune no longer talks about “Blessed Hirak”in reference to the popular protest movement that took place in 2019, as it did immediately after his election, on December 12, 2019, with an official participation rate of 39.8%, the lowest in the history of presidential elections in Algeria. The president’s motto is now“New Algeria”.
The arrests and trials of ministers and businessmen around Saïd Bouteflika, brother of former president Abdelaziz Bouteflika who publicly humiliated Abdelmadjid Tebboune when he was prime minister – are presented as evidence of a ” change “ regime and politics. However, this is not enough to convince public opinion, which has not forgotten that the candidate to succeed him was for a long time a minister of Abdelaziz Bouteflika and supported the latter’s plan for a fifth term. But the systematic and continuous repression against Hirak activists and the control of a press heavily dependent on state advertising prevent any debate on the results of a mandate marked at its beginning by a long period of paralysis.
A major clean-up in the military hierarchy
First, the sudden death from a heart attack of Abdelmadjid Tebboune’s godfather and former army chief of staff, General Ahmed Gaïd Salah, on 23 December 2019, ten days after his election, took him by surprise and triggered the start of a major internal cleansing within the military hierarchy. Abdelmadjid Tebboune would relaunch himself with the referendum on the revision of the Constitution, which was held on 1Ahem November 2020, but four days before the election he was rushed to Germany after contracting Covid-19. The constitutional revision, which enshrines a strengthening of presidential power, the granting of a defence mission to the army, “vital and strategic interests of the country” and the possibility of deploying troops abroad did not revolutionize the regime, but the rate of participation in the referendum demonstrated popular disinterest. Only 23.7% of those registered participated.
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