Algierscapital of Algeria and its most populous and important city is just 50 minute flight from Barcelona; or what is the same, to 521 kilometers in a straight line, a distance similar to that between the Catalan capital and Madrid. At least as far as the Valencian Community, Balearic Islands, Region of Murcia Y Catalonia, is the closest southern neighbor, even closer than Morocco. With a recent history marked by a bloody national liberation war waged against French colonial power in the 1950s and early 1960s, it is a country with a proud political class, hypersensitive to questions of sovereignty and that does not accept easily be ignored. Thanks to its enormous territorial extension, with 2.7 million square kilometersand its vast reserves of gas Y Petroleumhas traditionally considered itself as a regional power and a ideological referent of movements like anticolonialisman influential role that seems determined to recover in this third decade of the 21st century.
Algerian political power –you can, as it is known in local journalistic circles – is not “sole proprietorship“, assures EL PERIÓDICO Eduard Soler i Lechasenior researcher at Barcelona Center for International Affairs (CIDOB). “Many people participate in the decision-making process, in many cases from the military and security fields,” continues this expert. A collegiate government in which, as in any human group, divisions prevail, following family ties either professionals and forming clans that compete with each other and that ultimately aspire to get high and hoard resources. “During Bouteflika’s presidency, there was a lot of talk about clan of Tlemcen (a town near the border with Morocco) since the former head of state was born there,” he concludes.
The rise of fundamentalism
Algeria was the scene, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, of the first truly free and multiparty elections held in the Arab world, a kind of first Arab spring that catapulted institutions such as mayors to the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), a fundamentalist Muslim formation that at that time benefited from the discredit of the former single party, the National Liberation Front. The democratic experiment ended tragically in the first days of 1992, when a coup d’état canceled the second round of the legislative elections in which the FIS was about to obtain an overwhelming victory, unleashing a bloody civil war that provoked around 200,000 deaths and shocking massacres and collective beheadings in various locations in the Mitija, the fertile plain that surrounds Algiers.
After two decades of those terrible eventsbetween 2019 and 2020, the North African country has lived to the rhythm of massive citizen protests demanding political reforms, which have only served to remove from power Abelaziz Bouteflikaa long-lived president who held office for two decades, sick and incapable in the last years of his term, but who have not advanced the country in the path of democratization. “During the Bouteflika era, the Army had been displaced from the center of power, but with its departure, the generals have taken over again of all the springs of power; the current president is just a Paper Man“, says an Algerian journalist with many years of experience and based in France. Abdelmajid Tebbounethe current head of state, was elected in the elections held in December 2019 without strong opponents, which registered a record abstention rateclose to 60%, due to the call of the opposition movement to boycott the electoral consultation.
Largest in Africa
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as a country more extensive of the African continent and a benchmark for the movements that fought against colonization during the 1970s, Algeria has always aspired to have a “global projection“, a role that in recent years had been very limited due to the delicate state of health of the head of state. “It wants to return to being a country of weight”, points out the analyst Soler i Lecha. From the era in which it played a global role, it maintains “close ties with South Africa and enjoys great weight in the African Union, which has even allowed the membership of the Polisario Front “in the organization”, continues the analyst. It defines itself as a country “belonging to the Arab world”, “and with a priority interest” in the Sahel zone”, he concludes.
Due to this zeal in everything that affects national sovereignty, most analysts find it hard to believe that Russia has With capacity of forcing Algiers to adopt foreign policy decisions or even more, to open a crisis with Spain, as the Spanish Foreign Minister asserts, Jose Manuel Albares. “I disagree, how champion of non-interventionismAlgeria has shown itself to be neutral in many of the recent conflicts, and always protects with particular zeal what it considers to be their national interests“, assures Anthony Skinner, independent risk advisor for several countries, including Algeria. “Simply put, the plan to grant autonomy to Western Sahara is impossible to take for the Algerian authorities,” he stresses.